TEXAS TRANSPORTATION COMMISSION MEETING

Dewitt Greer Building
Commission Room
125 East 11th Street
Austin, Texas

9:00 a.m. Thursday, September 24, 1998

COMMISSION MEMBERS:

DAVID M. LANEY, Chairman
ANNE S. WYNNE
ROBERT L. NICHOLS

DEPARTMENT STAFF:

CHARLES W. HEALD, Executive Director
KIRBY W. PICKETT, Deputy Executive Director
MIKE BEHRENS, Assistant Executive Director
for Engineering Operations

P R O C E E D I N G S

MR. LANEY: Good morning. I'd like to call the meeting of the Texas Transportation Commission to order and note for the record that public notice of this meeting, containing all items of the agenda, was filed with the Office of the Secretary of State at 11:21 a.m. on September 16, 1998.

I want to welcome all of you this morning, and I understand there may be some not in this room but still here by video to appear later. We have a number of delegations this morning. A pleasure to have you all here today. We've got a lot of business today and quite a few delegations, including some speaking in opposition to presentations made by the delegations, so it will be a very full agenda.

Before we get started, though, our custom is -- and a lot has gone on in the last few months on a number of fronts from a transportation standpoint, so it's probably an opportune time to hear from both other members of the Commission if they have anything they'd like to begin with. Anne, any addition?

MS. WYNNE: Nothing.

MR. LANEY: Robert.

MR. NICHOLS: The only comment I would like to say is I realize a lot of you have taken time out of your work to come here today a long ways to attend these meetings because of your concern for your community, and I would like to thank you for doing that. It's very helpful for us, and communities don't happen, they're built by the people who are concerned, and let you know that we appreciate that. That's really all I have.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Robert.

I'd like to add one thing that is a message that I think you'll be hearing from the department and the Commission regularly between now and the end of June of 1999, and that is, despite the fact that we have made an enormous stride in transportation funding in Texas with TEA 21, increasing our federal allocation by somewhere in the range of $700- to $715 million a year on average over the next six years, what that has created is the need to match and increase our federal match requirements with state dollars, to the tune of about $180- to $200 million a year in order to retrieve those federal dollars.

By using that level of state funding, what we threaten to curtail is our state-funded construction program which includes things such as: hurricane evacuation routes, farm to market expansion/rehabilitation, some bridge work, et cetera, et cetera, some very serious and important programs that we've had in place now for a number of years.

The short of it is we need relief and we will need your support as we head into the legislative session in '99 to help find that relief. We have made a number of proposals to some legislative committees and those proposals will continue to air, and to the extent you have any questions, please feel free to call the Department and ask them.

But in effect, what we are asking for is to reposition the Department of Public Safety with another source of support for its operations. It now is covered by about $300- to $325 million a year from the Highway Fund, and it, no doubt, is in great need of that level of funding. Now, we have no quarrel at all with that and that very well may be inadequate funding for DPS, but right now we are facing an impasse unless there is relief, and the impasse will show itself in the form of a much constricted state construction program over the next couple of years, between '99 and 2001, unless we have relief in '99.

So to the extent we can count on your support, we would certainly like to be able to do so. And at the risk of covering territory that many of you have already heard and virtually all of you will hear over and over again, if you pay attention at least to transportation issues in Texas, over the next few months we will beat this horse down and over and over and kick it while it’s down until we get some kind of relief. It's just very, very important for transportation. But other than that statement, we will not be dwelling on that further today.

As I mentioned, we do have a full agenda, and unless there's any addition -- I don't think there is -- we will now proceed with the delegation presentations, and I would like to ask -- and I'll repeat this as we proceed through the morning -- for the delegations to hold their presentations to 20 minutes. We don't have a gong, but we have the equivalent, so please try to adhere to the 20-minute time frame, particularly because of the fact that we have such a full agenda this morning.

CITY OF MINEOLA

(Mayor Celia Boswell, Kenneth Wilson, Rep. Ted Kamel,

Sen. David Cain, Rep. Tom Ramsay)

MR. LANEY: The first delegation this morning is from the City of Mineola to discuss the extension of FM 564, and I'll call on Mayor Celia Boswell to lead off the presentation. Welcome, Mayor Boswell.

MAYOR BOSWELL: Thank you so much for letting us come today. We are here from Mineola, Texas. Some of you know where Mineola is and some don't; I'll get to our map in just a minute to remind you.

My name is Celia Boswell and I'm the mayor from Mineola, and I have brought with me today, in support of this project, some of our most outstanding citizens. I'll ask our delegation from Mineola to please stand so that you can see how many people have paid their own way to come to Austin and take two days off work. So we thank you.

Each of these citizens with us today represents many, many more who weren't able to come. This is a very important project to our community.

My request is small, and you'll be happy to hear, Chairman Laney, right off the bat, that I'm not here to ask for money. I am here to ask you to offer the Tyler TxDOT office continued authorization to move our project along, which is the extension of FM 564. We started on it in 1968; we are half through. This is the fourth time a delegation has come to Austin to visit with you about it.

And let me show you now where Mineola is, in case you haven't visited us, and I'm sure that you're going to want to, so let me show you where we are. You'll see Dallas and Fort Worth, Tyler to our south, and Mineola which is on the south end of Wood County.

FM 564 offers us an important outlet on the south, and yet we have not quite finished our south quadrant. We are requesting that it be completed on the southeast, because the southwest option is no longer feasible. Just above Mineola on the north is the Loew's distribution center in Mount Pleasant; and to the south, soon to be opened in Lindale, 15 miles to our south between Mineola and Tyler, is the Target distribution center with their oceans and oceans and oceans of trucks. They'll be going east and west on Interstate 20 and north and south right through the center of downtown Mineola.

Everybody who comes to Mineola gets an opportunity to go right through the center of our historic downtown. We have children on bicycles, pedestrians, we have a full downtown with 100 percent occupancy, and every 18-wheeler, every car gets to go right through the center of our historic downtown. We welcome them to come, but there's no place for truck parking, so we find that it has a hazard connected to it.

But even more than that, you have in front of you the real reason for this request and the reason we're asking you to expedite it, and that is, our town is bisected east and west by the Union Pacific Railroad tracks. Here we have, on your monitor, a police car with its lights flashing, waiting to go to the scene of a crime in south Mineola while the train is passing.

We have between 27 and 28 freight trains per day, averaging seven minutes apiece, on the railroad tracks, and I'm calculating that that's giving us a little over four hours a day where the railroad tracks are blocked east and west. Amtrak stops in Mineola eight times a week, blocking the tracks an additional five to seven minutes, so this has become a major problem for us, access to the other half of our city, and not to mention for you when you want to drive through our town, traffic backs way up.

You see here now the train has passed and the traffic is clearing out from the railroad tracks. I live six blocks up from the railroad tracks on this street and often look out my window and see the cars waiting in line waiting to get through that intersection, and there is no other way to get in and out of Mineola except over these tracks. We really do need help.

Our emergency vehicle people will be here soon to discuss this with you after I'm through. And now we have our EMS ambulance sitting there with its lights flashing, waiting for the train.

I started to tell you that this was our third delegation, but I was surprised to find out at breakfast this morning this is our fourth delegation. We really do need to have this completed.

We do have an opposing delegation here to speak with you, and I need to tell you, this is a family over whose land our southeast quadrant will pass. They are our friends, they are loved and respected members of our community. I am totally in sympathy with whatever presentation they want to make, and I have no answers here except to say that we respect them very highly and we sympathize. I know of no way to put in a road without going over somebody's property and I terribly regret that.

I have visited and they have visited with our TxDOT engineers, and our TxDOT engineers in Tyler are willing to accommodate this in every way we possibly can to shift and develop and try to meet their problems, and we hope that we're going to end up with everybody being happy.

But as you can see now, on our site projection map, we have the upper east north quadrant is complete, the upper northwest quadrant is complete. We can't put it through there anymore, because someone built schools on our northwest quadrant, so now we have nothing left to finish but we do need to finish our southeast quadrant which runs through some rural farmland that doesn't have a house that we have to go through yet.

So I would ask you if you would authorize the Tyler District to continue work on this project. At this point, the projected completion date might possibly be 2002; if we could accelerate that, that would be absolutely great.

We move slow in East Texas, but we think it's about time to finish this project if we can. We thank you so much for listening to us, and we thank you for what you do for transportation in Texas, and we thank you for what you do for Texas. Thank you so much.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Mayor. We appreciate the presentation.

MAYOR BOSWELL: Our County Commissioner will speak with you next.

MR. WILSON: Good morning. My name is Kenneth Wilson and I'm County Commissioner, Precinct 2, Wood County, which covers Mineola and five or six miles in each direction from Mineola.

On the proposed extension of this loop, it will all be built in my precinct, which will alleviate some of the traffic coming out of other counties on county roads. I'm fully aware that there's probably more requests than there is money, and I guess there always will be. We just came out of budget hearings for the county a few days ago, and I know where you're coming from, and we didn't fund everything. But we would certainly like to impress on you the fact that we need this loop in Mineola, Texas, and actually, the sooner, the better.

We need stuff in the rural counties as well as your urban areas, and I still know that a lot of money has to go to urban areas because there's more people impacted there than there would be out in the country.

You know, an important part of county government is to anticipate the needs and plan ahead. When you get a county government or any form of government that is not planning ahead, then you've got a dead government. We have tried to do this. Wood County is located, as the Mayor said, about 80 miles east of the Dallas-Fort Worth area and about the same distance from the Shreveport area, and we're having a phenomenal growth pattern. Since 1990, I believe we're something like 12 or 13 percent growth, and it will continue, I think.

Well, the other counties around us are also having this type growth, and so the additional traffic out of other counties also hurts us on our roads. And also, as your roads become more crowded, regardless of where it comes from, then your hazards increase.

So that's the reason, the truck traffic mainly is the reason we want to get it out of downtown Mineola. In the first place, there's not room for it; the next place is it carries many hazards with it, stops the flow of traffic; and as the Mayor brought up about the railroads, when a train is stopped in Mineola, you have about half or better of Wood County held as hostage, about half. You can't get your emergency vehicles across, fire trucks, police, emergency medical, or any other emergencies that might come up.

And if we had this small section of that loop completed, it would, I think -- well, I know it would help us greatly. At the present time, if you have an emergency and for some reason a train was there and could not move, it's several miles in both directions to get back across the tracks. And you also have a lot of hazardous cargo and what-have-you with your truck traffic through there.

I'd like to thank you again for your support of this very important project, and it's time to finish the job, I think. Wood County is ready, the commissioners court is ready, and I'm ready to do all that I can. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Commissioner. Appreciate it.

There are others signed up to speak on this matter.

REP. KAMEL: Good morning. My name is Ted Kamel. I'm a friendly state representative with our neighbor, Representative Ramsay, and I'm here to support him and Senator Cain and the mayor. The hat I'm wearing today, though, officially is as an area service representative for East Texas Medical Center EMS. We provide ambulance service to all the surrounding areas of north and southeast Texas and we cover significant parts of Wood County.

As the mayor brought up, my number one priority here today is to emphasize public safety and saving lives. The area is growing, and as you bring in more people into an area, there's going to be a greater demand for emergency medical services.

We are blessed in the East Texas area, especially in the Wood County area, of having four very good trauma centers: there's one in Quitman, one in Winnsboro, which both of those are north of Mineola; and there's Trinity Mother Frances, and East Texas Medical Center located in Tyler. The dilemma is that when we pick up patients north of Mineola who choose to go to one of the trauma centers in Tyler, or by necessity because of what's being offered at those centers, we have to go through the city of Mineola, and when time is of essence and you're counting seconds, not minutes or hours, having to wait for a train or go through the traffic there.

And as the mayor said -- and I go through Mineola quite often -- even though that is a business district, it is very residential right through the community of Mineola.

For those that we pick up south of Mineola who choose to go to one of the trauma centers either in Quitman or Winnsboro, again there's only way through to get to those trauma centers, and that's right through the center of Mineola.

That's why we support this project. It's a project that started back when I was about eight years old, and we would like to see it, for the health and safety factors. As the mayor laid out, we would like to see it, and that's why we're here in full support of it. And if you don't have any questions, thank you for having us.

MR. LANEY: Thanks. We have a couple of other folks signed up, I believe. Thank you.

REP. RAMSAY: Good morning, folks. My name is Tom Ramsay. I'm the state representative from this county and neighbor to Ted Kamel. I appreciate your time this morning; I'm not going to take a lot of your time.

This is important to this area, this bypass is, and I'm here in full support of it, but also, Commissioner Laney -- or Speaker Laney -- can I refer to you as Speaker Laney? I feel better doing that.

MR. LANEY: I'd take it as a compliment, but you might get in trouble across the street.

(Laughter.)

REP. RAMSAY: And by the way, this was started before I was born; I wasn't here in 1968.

(Laughter.)

REP. RAMSAY: But I'm here to lend my support to these folks, but also lend it to you, to the Commission, in an effort to require what funding it takes to complete this project and others that we rural legislators think that are important, and there are several in my district that we've talked about before, but this is an important one.

With the surplus this year -- I know you've all heard about the $3.7 billion -- I am for real delving into what's important to do with that money. I know there's a lot of political -- me included -- politicians out there that are promising this and that, but I think we ought to look at the priorities, and I certainly believe that roads and highways, particularly in the rural areas. And we're not here denying that the urban areas need farm to market road money or whatever, but we also need it.

It's not a contest between -- sometimes it works out that way in the legislature, as you well know -- a contest between rural and urban legislators, but we ask you sincerely to consider this project, to move it along as quick as you can, and I will promise you that I will help you where I can with funding. Thank you very much.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Representative Ramsay.

SEN. CAIN: Mr. Chairman and members of the Commission.

MR. LANEY: There's an adjustment on that thing.

SEN. CAIN: Is there an adjustment? Thank you. I really am not going to be here that long, I hope.

(Laughter.)

SEN. CAIN: I'm David Cain, as I think you know. I'm the proud state senator from District 2, and have the honor of representing Mineola and Wood County in the legislature. An eloquent case has been made to you this morning for the acceleration of this loop around Mineola, and I'm not going to reiterate that here today. It is unfortunate, I think, that some very well-meaning folks who are part of the delegation, that I think will speak to you in a minute, are in opposition to it. That troubles me, as it does Representative Ramsay and others. But in looking at the concerns which particularly involve health and safety, not just annoyance of backup of traffic but I mean real problems in moving our emergency vehicles and so forth, I know of no other way to do it than to speed this project up as quickly as we can, and that's what this delegation is asking you to do.

Mayor Boswell and I think Commissioner Wilson put the case to you very well, and the statistics that I believe you have in front of you as part of your packet today also speak volumes of the importance of this project. I'm here to lend my name to that, and thank you very much.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Senator Cain. Appreciate it.

We have at least one person signed up to speak in opposition. Is that the conclusion of the presentation, Mayor? Is there anybody else in favor of it that's going to be speaking?

MAYOR BOSWELL: We're through. Thank you.

OPPOSITION

(Lou Steele)

MR. LANEY: Lou E. Steele to speak in opposition of it.

MS. STEELE: Good morning. I'm glad to be here. My name is Lou Steele; I am representing my family and professional truck drivers who are on the road and can't be here today.

My family has been in Mineola for 70 years, have served in various capacities in Mineola: mayor, commissioners, everything else you can think of. What I would like to do today is tell you why we oppose and what exactly it is we oppose. Obviously, we do not oppose getting a safe route across the railroad track; this is not what we oppose.

I've given you a package of my handout; I will go through some of them very quickly, others of them not so quickly. What I would like to do today is very quickly -- 20 minutes -- go over this with you. I've told you who we are, who I am representing, and I've told you why we're here: we need for someone to listen to what our concerns are.

To understand our concerns, I think you have to know what has happened in the past -- I've included a brief chronology; I think you need to pay most attention to our issues and our argument against not a proposed loop but the proposed loop.

In 1995 in November, there was a town hall meeting to discuss the continuation of Farm to Market Road 564 to the southeast side of Mineola through the industrial park. That is an area in Mineola which has not developed very much and I think maybe it's because there's not really any access to it.

Following that meeting, the next thing that we knew -- we being the general public -- there was a public meeting last summer in 1997 where up on the wall there was a large map with three routes drawn through it, connecting Highway 69 and the south side of town to Highway 80 which would join into the loop. None of these three routes were through the industrial area; all three of these routes were through my family's land.

The next thing we knew is that surveyors came and started surveying the land earlier this year, the late winter and the early spring, and they assured us that there would be a public meeting this summer. One of the survey groups went right through my mother's new home, her trailer home that she had lived in, and the pole barn where all the tractors and vehicles are stored. This concerned me more than a little bit. And so we were told that there would be a public hearing this summer; it didn't happen.

On the night of September 3, three weeks ago, I received a call at home saying: Oh, there is a meeting in Austin -- which I had read a delegation was going in the newspaper a couple of weeks before, but there was not much more about that -- but I was told that there was a meeting here and that would be the opportunity to speak about what we opposed.

So I got really busy and gathered information. I had never even seen a map of the proposed route, except for these three things on the wall which my mother and my sister had seen. So anyway, here we are.

What I would like to go over are the issues that I see need to be addressed, need to be thought about prior to saying: Okay, let's do it, just do it, a loop, fine. One of the things that I think really needs to be thought about is that public involvement doesn't just mean the city council of a town. It means the public, those affected by any decision that is taken, and decisions, I believe, need to be made in conjunction with those who are going to be most affected by it.

I was told when I started digging on this -- I couldn't understand how all this happened. I didn't live in Mineola; I was working; I just retired; I've moved home. So what I did was I started digging around to find out what had happened.

Between the 1995 meeting when it was to discuss a connector going through the industrial area, between that time and the public meeting in 1997, feasibility studies were conducted. I've worked with the TxDOT engineer there in Mineola and I said, Well, how were these three routes chosen. What happened?

Well, we did feasibility studies and rough surveyed out some routes.

And I said, Well, how did you do that? All the land that the three routes are on is my mom's and my aunt's land, so how did you do it?

Well, I think we did it from the road.

Well, I don't think so, because you can't see the land from the road. And what I finally found out -- I too am an engineer, I'm a retired engineer now -- I found out they used a topo map, a topography map and took the high land. And if you look -- and, boy, have I looked in the last three weeks -- that is exactly what it is. The route that is proposed parallels a creek and stays on the highest land available. It's maybe not the best route, but it is the easiest to build route.

What I understand from the engineers now is that the -- or what I've seen, actually, is that the road has been designed, the route has been set of the three, and the road has been designed. This is one of the things I want to show you; I hope you can see this. This is a map of the area around Mineola.

This is downtown Mineola here; here is the -- and for lack of a better word, I will call it a loop; this is Farm to Market Road 564 that goes from Highway 80 on the west side of Mineola to Highway 80 on the east side of Mineola; this is Highway 69 going south to Tyler. This road right here is what is called CAP Ranch Road; it's my grandfather's initials, C-A-P; it's called CAP Ranch Road, that's how it's always referred to.

This is where they showed you while ago where the loop is proposed to go through is just like this and connecting back up. As I say, it is the very shortest route -- not the shortest route, excuse me -- it is the safest route, easiest to design route.

That route presents some problems not only to my family, but to truck drivers who would be asked to use this connector. I'm going to try to represent the truckers that I've spoken to, and in particular Mr. David Dunahoe, who has corresponded with TxDOT on this. He has some really big concerns. This existing loop is a two-lane, no-shoulder, old farm to market road.

There is the intersection of Farm to Market 564 with Highway 69 on the north side of town which is called Death Hill, and rightly so. It is where a group of children on a bus were killed a few years ago -- or in a van going to a retreat, they were killed there. It is a terrible hill, it is a very, very steep grade hill. I don't know the grade exactly, but it is a very steep hill.

One of the big safety concerns of the trucker, besides the fact that this is an old, two-lane, no-shoulder road with lots of curves in it, is at this intersection, if a truck driver were heading south on Highway 69, came down the hill -- it's a very steep hill; there's a light now at the bottom of the hill since the deaths -- and was forced or was told that he must not travel through Mineola as a trucker, you must go around Mineola, they will have to make a really hard left, coming down the hill, loaded.

Mr. Dunahoe is extremely concerned. He guarantees that there will be rollovers. He is from the area, he was raised here, he knows it well. He feels that it's just a really -- it's an accident waiting to happen.

Right now truckers come down the hill and go through the light. They make the light, as he calls it. If a truck driver were on the loop and had to turn right to go north on Highway 69, they would have to go from a dead stop, because they're making a 90-degree turn, to pull a hill. He feels like the impatient driver behind him might do something silly, when he is coming from a dead stop, starting pulling a load right up that hill.

His biggest concern, besides the safety, is that there needs to be a true bypass of Mineola for the truckers, not a two-lane farm to market road. The existing piece which is not in this project to be rebuilt is two lane, narrow, no shoulders. The piece that is being proposed is a more modern one, two lane with shoulders. But it's not a true bypass of the town.

One of the other things that greatly concerns Mr. Dunahoe is the fact that the route, the connector that is being proposed right now goes right through cattle operations. People who operate cattle, like my 80-year-old mother sitting back here, gets on her tractor; she considers it a bad day if it rains and she can't be on her tractor.

Splitting her land in half makes her have to get on the road with a tractor. Right now it's CAP Ranch Road, right now it's very easy. We have five or six cars a day that come down it; they're all mostly kin. She can get on her tractor; people expect tractors. But truck drivers going 60 or 70 miles an hour are not going to expect traffic.

The next safety concern I need to tell you about is my own personal concern for my mother's safety. If you can see this, this is my mother's house; this is the existing CAP Ranch Road, this little road right here; this is my cousin David's house. Right now my mother's gate, as well as my cousin David's, is on CAP Ranch Road. CAP Ranch Road is a little hardtop road and that's not a problem.

The proposed route goes right through my mother's front gate and over through her hay pasture and over through the northern part of David's property. With this, in my opinion, my mother would not be around very much longer. I'm sorry. I cannot imagine her turning into a gate -- I was told, well, you know, there's plenty of shoulder, she can park on the shoulder to open her gate. I said, People drive on the shoulders. Well, people shouldn't drive on the shoulders. Well, what people should and shouldn't do doesn't really matter, what is done is what matters.

This is a terrible concern of mine. I think that if indeed the route had to come through here, that something would have to be worked out to give my mother clear access to her home. This is not going to work. I'm sorry.

The other safety aspect, which is yet again a personal one, is for the farmer that has to operate a split acreage operation. This is the extension of the road, this is the rest of it; this is all I've been able to see. This right here is the hay meadow where all of the hay is raised for feeding the cattle. We run about 60 head of cattle. This splits and goes right through the meadow, you know, the place where the best hay is grown, the meadow.

I was told that a box culvert could be built for access for the cows. I said, Well, access for the cows is necessary, but access for the tractor to feed the cattle and the shredder and the baler that is mandatory if you're going to have a lot of the acres, over half of the acres on the other side of the road. So we looked at it from an engineering standpoint and this route could sustain an 8x10, 10 foot high culvert which you could drive a tractor through but you cannot drive a baler, a shredder, or you can't even haul a round bale of hay.

Besides that, imagine driving a 50-meter long, 8x10 box culvert in a diesel tractor, imagine the pollution, the emission, the collection in that expanse, in that length. I just don't think this is a viable solution.

The other thing I wanted to talk about is when you plan a road and split a property, you need to talk to the landowner, you need to talk. All of this is you need to communicate. You must communicate with the landowner to see what their cattle operation is. All of the hay to feed the cattle is raised right there in the pasture; that is the only pasture. That pasture was put in in 1965, it took 13 years to get that pasture in the shape to be able to win an award at the hay show. Mother and Daddy -- before he passed away -- have won numerous awards, finished in the top ten in the longest running, biggest hay show in the United States.

This route would cut off her accessibility to her hay, she wouldn't be able to feed her cattle. And the engineer said, Well, move the hay pasture. You don't just move a hay pasture. You need to talk to the farmers.

What we would like to see is a serious consideration of alternatives to this proposed route. I feel that, having talked to the engineers and looked at the schedule, this is not a proposed route any longer; this is the route, this is the design. I feel like Don Quixote standing up here, I truly do.

There are things that have happened since all of this has gone on, this design and everything. One of the major ones I see -- and what I have been doing the last two weeks is calling people, talking to people -- one of the major ones I see is that the land -- and this is to me very, very important -- this land right here used to all be what's now called CAP Ranch, down to the river; that was my grandfather's.

The family sold that years and years ago. Recently, in the last couple of weeks, the City of Mineola has purchased that land. So everything south of existing CAP Ranch Road down to the river has been purchased and is now owned by the City of Mineola. They have incorporated the uplands. Now, obviously this is the Sabine River, so my grandfather used to have rice paddies down there.

MR. LANEY: Ms. Steele, if we can focus on what you want to propose, that would be terrific.

MS. STEELE: This is exactly what I'm going to propose. This is owned by the city. I talked to the mayor; I said, What about putting the road across the city property. That would be fine with her, she wants a road built. Great. This piece of the old farm has been sold. I have talked to the owner of that who has now bought almost all the way back to Highway 80; he wants a road through his mega-cattle operation so he can ship his cattle, get his big trucks in and out of there; he is all in favor of a road.

This is what we are proposing: that the road be to the south of the existing CAP Rand Road, on the city property and through Mr. Pierce Boyd's property. It's a viable solution, I believe, that would satisfy everybody. Put the road where people actually want the road, and the engineering feasibility of that is very simple. There is not a problem from an engineering standpoint on that.

The last thing that I need to say is just one thing that the truckers were saying about the congestion in downtown Mineola. They feel there is not congestion in downtown Mineola, that four or five trucks on four lanes -- Mineola is three or four lanes all the way through it -- they feel that this is not congested, and that a proper bypass, rather than a loop, needs to be built around the city.

We agree that a cross needs to be built, a crossover for the emergency vehicles. There are some that they haven't mentioned that already are there. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Ms. Steele. Appreciate it. You raised some legitimate and sympathetic issues I think we'll take a look at.

Any comments?

MR. NICHOLS: I didn't have any question about what she was talking about, but I did have a question probably -- I don't know if it's to the mayor or to the staff, but it has to do with there were some comments on the southwest quadrant -- I think you made some comment on that. I know, in our package staff put together, there is no indication on the map of the southwest quadrant, but in the write-up and executive summary, it refers to "construction authority and development of the southwest quadrant."

MAYOR BOSWELL: Commissioner Nichols, this was started a long time ago, and as you can see, we've gotten the two northern halves of this thing finished, and I don't know who made this decision, but somewhere along the way, someone made a decision to put our schools, our brand new schools on the northwest quadrant. So if we develop the southwest quadrant, then that's going to throw that truck traffic past our schools, and we just had a huge outcry from parents about the idea of all of that increased traffic flow. So we kind of put that off to the side, decided since this was rural land, that basically the only way we could go would be the southeast quadrant. That's the only answer for that.

MR. LANEY: Any other questions?

MS. WYNNE: So where you're headed: what's a loop without the fourth part of it?

MR. NICHOLS: Yes. So there is no indication that the community is ever going to want the southwest quadrant?

MAYOR BOSWELL: I don't think it's going to ever be doable if we're going to have to run it up around through the northwest quadrant to get to 69, and it's my understanding, under the Trunk System, that the day will come when there will be a major artery on the west end farther out from the city, but because of the way this thing has come out, we're really reduced now to having to ask for this one little piece so we'll have three-fourths of a loop, but probably never four-fourths.

MR. NICHOLS: I'm somewhat familiar with that route, because I've driven it quite a bit, and the 69 corridor is being developed.

MAYOR BOSWELL: It is.

MR. NICHOLS: And as that's developed into a four-lane divided, you're going to be driving a lot more trucks and your traffic counts will dramatically go up in that area in an eight, ten-year period of time.

MAYOR BOSWELL: Right. It's my understanding, from visiting with the TxDOT engineers, that that southwest quadrant will be part of the new. But our feeling here is we need immediate relief now. We're really in a situation that's dangerous, and that's all we're asking is just this little 2.2 mile thing to take the pressure off until the grand scheme is developed.

MR. NICHOLS: Okay. That answered my question. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Anne?

MS. WYNNE: No questions.

MR. LANEY: Thank you very much for the presentation, both those speaking in favor of this addition, and Ms. Steele, your comments were appreciated in connection with your opposition to it.

As you all know, we don't make calls on these kinds of issues from the bench, so to speak. We'll take a very close look at it and be back in touch with you shortly.

We'll now take about a five-minute recess and allow the Mineola delegation to move out and I believe it's the Nocona delegation to move in. Thank you all very much for coming.

(Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)

NOCONA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

(Rep. Charles Finnell, Mildred Nunneley)

MR. LANEY: Let's reconvene our Commission meeting for this morning and remind the delegations that there's a 20-minute time limit on presentations. Although we seemed to exceed that the last go-round, let's see if we can hold that.

Our second delegation this morning is the Nocona Chamber of Commerce -- although it looks like we have the entire city of Nocona.

(Laughter and applause.)

MR. LANEY: We are delighted to have all of you here. I hope somebody is holding the fort down; I hope you have guards at the corners of the town since it's abandoned for the moment. I believe this delegation is here to discuss the expansion of US 82 between Nocona and Henrietta, and as I understand it, to lead off the presentation of the Highway 82 Improvement Committee, we have Representative Charles Finnell. Welcome, Representative.

REP. FINNELL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good morning. Charles Finnell. I bring greetings from your Appropriations Committee and your Transportation Committee in the House.

MR. LANEY: That's why we've allowed you to go first.

(Laughter.)

REP. FINNELL: We think about you often and admire the work of the largest state agency in Texas. This day I appear before you as a member of the Nocona Chamber of Commerce, as well as state representative for the 13 counties which comprise the 68th House District. And of course, Montague County is in the Wichita District of TxDOT and we are very proud that you sent us Gene Adams. He's doing a great job, Mr. Heald; we certainly know you have a good man interim in that position.

We want to focus on a very dangerous part of Texas. We're talking about as you leave Nocona headed west, there's no doubt in my mind it's the most dangerous part of many, many miles of state highways that are in my district. We don't have any interstate highways in the entire 13 counties that I represent. We're proud of our state highways, but this is one that really needs to be expanded, beginning in Nocona, going east towards the Montague County line.

The traffic has tremendously increased. We have some very sad stories that will be told today about deaths which have occurred on this highway, very recently, 14-year-old people that died in this very section.

I also want to mention that there's a very big industrial development project coming out of Oklahoma which will bring a great deal more truck traffic, and this has been in the Nocona news, but I want to tell you that there's definitely a high volume expected from the Oklahoma sources that probably is not on your books as far as traffic.

It's the most dangerous part of our district and we want to simply ask that it be led in the direction of a four-lane highway. And the people of Montague County, back in the early '70s, voted a tax upon themselves and have money in the bank, if you will, for their portion, the 10 percent right of way and utility relocation. So they do not come to you empty-handed. They come to you well prepared, financially, emotionally, and I can tell you that this is completely unanimous.

In fact, I would like, first of all, to ask everyone here from Nocona, Montague County delegation to please rise to identify yourselves.

(Applause.)

REP. FINNELL: Thank you. There are over 100 of them; they set their alarm clocks mighty early, two buses and lots of cars to be here.

With that, I will introduce Mildred Nunneley. Mildred Nunneley also serves on our Texas-Oklahoma Red River Boundary Commission. Those of you who have been following that know that she has well experienced Montague County and she is the ideal spokesperson, so I'm glad my time did not come out of her 20 minutes, and I do want to introduce Mildred Nunneley to be the spokesman for the Nocona Chamber of Commerce Highway 82 Four-Lane Project. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Representative Finnell.

(Applause.)

MR. LANEY: Representative Finnell, whose time did your time come out of?

(Laughter.)

MS. NUNNELEY: Greetings from Nocona, the Chamber of Commerce, and Montague County. We're delighted to be here.

We requested this private -- semi -- audience with you today because we wanted to bring to you firsthand some facts about Highway 82 in our area and encourage you to complete a project that was begun in 1971 by expanding 82 to four lanes from the western edge of Nocona to the Montague-Clay County line. You've already received some information and support material that I know you've had the opportunity to look at, but we also today have brought a map, and I would like to refer to that as we begin our discussion.

Some of you don't come from anywhere around our part, so we'd like for you to know where we are. This is Montague County. We're predominantly an agricultural county still, located along the Red River. This is Highway 82 as it traverses the northern part of Texas.

I think it might be appropriate at this point to make mention of the adjoining states of northern Louisiana, Arkansas and southeastern Oklahoma. You will note that any traffic entering Texas from the east side is rather quickly diverted to the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex via

I-30; that is, if you want to drive, as most people do, on a four-lane divided highway.

We think that the congestion that comes from so much traffic being diverted to this area is one of the factors that you would like to consider in our request for this stretch of Highway 82.

I can tell you that already some very important steps have been taken to see that this project is feasible and can be completed. Montague County has available the funds for our portion of the costs of highway rights of way, relocation of utilities and fences. These funds have been available, in fact, since 1972 when the four-lane section was completed through the Nocona town.

In addition, our district office of the Texas Department of Transportation in Wichita Falls has completed some studies that make this project feasible. They have identified all of the property owners involved; they have made estimates of the costs of relocating the fences and that sort of thing. It is estimated that it will cost $10.2 million to complete the first 12-1/2 miles, and then possibly another $2 million to complete the remainder, and I will address that factor in a moment.

Furthermore, we believe that this completion and expansion of 82 fits really well into the overall picture of the improvements being made by the Texas Department of Transportation throughout the north Texas area. The first project is your recent decision to expand Highway 82, this same highway but west of Wichita Falls, to connect with the expansion of Highway 277 which will make a four-lane divided highway all the way from Wichita Falls to Abilene. That would be the section that you note there.

Over on the east side, you have begun another project. At Sherman you are already acquiring, I understand, right of way to extend 82 as a four-lane roadway to the city of Bonham. In addition, in our immediate area, you have a project started at this time. At the interchange of Highway 81 and 82, located just outside the town of Ringgold, major improvements are underway there for that interchange; 81 leads into Oklahoma. And of course, 82 is the same 82 that we are addressing all through Montague County.

All of these improvements, your decision to improve the route to Abilene, the expansion of the four lane to Bonham, and this important new interchange at 81 and 82 in our own county, seem to us to make it a very desirable and opportune time to finish this small segment of 82 through our county.

We would like to make note of a special condition that exists on Highway 82. Just outside of the town of Ringgold, a railroad crosses over 82 at an overpass that does not meet the desired standards for height. At 13 feet and 3 inches, large loads and big equipment -- in fact, I think probably some of your Department's own equipment -- is forced to detour off 82 through the town of Ringgold. So this just seems like a very logical and opportune time to us to address all of these improvements together and to complete this segment so that traffic really flows smoothly throughout north Texas.

We know it's an opportune time for Montague County. The price of land, and thus the cost of acquiring right of way, moving fences, relocating utilities and building, is of course escalating. As the Metroplex moves farther and farther out, our land prices go up. And we have the money now; we'd like to do this while we can still afford it. We have over $500,000 -- $503,000, to be exact -- which they tell us will be more than enough to pay for our portion of the costs, but we'll be glad to dedicate any left over from that to the completion of the project.

We assure you we showed our good faith and our cooperation in 1972 when we voluntarily taxed ourselves to build this four-lane expansion all the way across Montague County. Two precincts involved voted to do this. Actually, one precinct got very little out of it, but they never complained; they were happy that we got part of the highway.

But we urge you now to complete a project that was begun 27 years ago and make this stretch of 82 from the western edge of Nocona -- all of the work has already been completed through the town, so it would start at the western edge of Nocona and go to the Montague-Clay County line.

We will even be happy to tell you that we support Clay County in their efforts to secure a four-lane extension from the Clay County line to Henrietta so that we could close that entire gap. We think that would be wonderful, and anything we can do to help them, we pledge that we will do.

We have a vision for the 21st Century. That vision includes our knowledge of the fact that we have a Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century. Texas will receive $11.3 billion over six years for highway improvements and for certain unspecified demonstration projects. Our vision for the beginning of this 21st Century is that 82 will be completed as a four-lane highway from the city of Nocona to the Montague-Clay County line.

We have the funds, we're willing to do it, we're ready to go; just give us the word. Thank you very much.

(Applause.)

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Ms. Nunneley. Appreciate the presentation.

Is there anyone else signed up to speak in connection with this particular matter?

MS. NUNNELEY: I don't think we have anyone else who wishes to speak. If there are questions, we're always happy to try to answer them. We do have the chairman of our task force here, and I would like to recognize Mr. Ken Coop who has worked long and hard on the Highway 82 expansion project. Ken Coop.

(Applause.)

MR. LANEY: Anne, any comments? Robert, do you have any comments or questions?

MR. NICHOLS: I think that is a very good route to be developed long term into a four-lane divided. As I've traveled around the state, it was very obvious that was a primary east-west corridor in the north end of the state.

MS. NUNNELEY: Actually, there is not one between Oklahoma City and Dallas.

MR. NICHOLS: Correct.

MS. NUNNELEY: But if you look at the map, we're logical, aren't we?

MR. NICHOLS: Nocona Boot Factory is in Nocona, isn't it?

MS. NUNNELEY: It is.

MR. NICHOLS: That's my favorite pair of boots; that's what I wear.

MS. NUNNELEY: Right on 82.

(Laughter.)

MR. NICHOLS: I know, I've been there.

I really didn't have any questions. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Any sense from our staff of what happened between 1971 and now? We probably just began to focus a little bit more on traffic volumes, and it's likely that the 26 or 27 years is a product of this section of 82 not quite ranking from a level of traffic that would meet funding requirements. On the other hand, the closure of gaps in our Trunk System and throughout Texas is an important aspect, and really a theme that I think we've been playing on ever since really at the instigation, and as a catalyst, Commissioner Nichols really took the Trunk System by the horns and wrestled it to the ground and got us all focused in a way that we had not before on the closing of gaps.

This looks to me like one of those, although it still might not rank from a traffic standpoint, I think it sure bears a careful study from our standpoint to see if, in fact, there is a way to help you close the opening here on 82. We've got a long way to go before we finish that task all the way from far east Texas to where we're going here, but this looks like it very well may be an attractive project.

Anne?

MS. WYNNE: I would ask our staff to take a look at this project and see if it could be segmented -- because that's how roads generally get built is in segments, as you all know -- and there may be a portion of this that could get done sooner rather than later. So when you all get back to us, would you take a look at this?

MR. LANEY: One question I had, and I was a little confused. From the information I've been looking at, it seems to focus us on a slightly longer segment than you are focused on, Ms. Nunneley. It's not 27.3 miles; you're looking at 12 or 15 miles. Right?

MS. NUNNELEY: Well, we represent Montague County and the Clay County line, as far as we feel free to speak, although we certainly are supportive of it going all the way into Henrietta. And as I say, we would do anything we could to help that come about, we just didn't feel that it was our place to speak for them. But it is 12-1/2 miles in Montague County and then another -- less than 15.

MR. LANEY: About 15.

MS. NUNNELEY: Into Henrietta. Right. And there 287 is already a four-lane divided highway going from there on into Wichita Falls, so that would -- by going to Henrietta, in other words, you would be making it four lane from Bonham to Wichita Falls where, of course, it connects on to go either to Amarillo or to Abilene. Both would be then complete four-lane divided roadways.

MR. LANEY: And what did you say our projected cost was on that 12?

MS. NUNNELEY: For the first 12-1/2 miles, the projected cost is $10.2 million. Now, the other approximately two miles remaining, they have estimated

$2 million, and I think that estimate is separated because of the overpass that I mentioned to you, and I don't know -- perhaps different funds do different things. Overpasses may come under some other section; I'm not that familiar with the way it's set up. But that makes it more than just a highway for that roughly two miles, but it would be two more miles to the county line from the $10.2 million figure that I used.

MR. LANEY: And the clearance on that overpass is slightly more than 13.

MS. NUNNELEY: Thirteen feet, three inches, I believe is what the sign says. And now, you know, there are big signs on the highway, they're well marked, but occasionally someone doesn't read it. As you know, we've had a few of those things happen under that overpass. You do have to leave Highway 82 and go out through the town of Ringgold and completely around it and then back on.

I don't know how they're doing that now that you have all the detours for this interchange with 81 and 82. We've got a couple of engineers from Wichita Falls. If you needed to know that, they could answer that, but that's out of my line.

MR. LANEY: Any other comments or questions?

Thank you very much for the presentation. It's very informative.

MS. NUNNELEY: We appreciate it very much. We're going to give you a little time back, I think.

MR. LANEY: Well, thank you very much; we can use it.

We're going to take a five-minute recess and allow you all to move on out. Again, I appreciate very much the effort it takes to get up this early in the morning and come down here for a presentation like this. It means a lot to us to have somebody pay that close attention to transportation issues. So thank you very much and have a very safe trip back.

(Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)

DUBLIN LOOP TASK FORCE

(Rep. Allen Place, Mark Kloster, Sen. David Sibley)

MR. LANEY: The meeting is reconvened. Our third delegation this morning is the Dublin Loop Task Force to discuss the construction of a loop around the City of Dublin. Just a reminder, as I have mentioned to each of the prior delegations, try to limit your presentation, if you can, to 20 minutes.

Let me call on State Representative Allen Place to lead off this delegation. Welcome, Representative Place.

REP. PLACE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members. My name is Allen Place; I currently represent State District 59 in the Texas House. I'm here today to offer my support to the Dublin delegation in their request to elevate the status of the Dublin relief route to Priority 2.

Many of you have been through Dublin, I’m sure. It's a small town, it's a beautiful town, a lot of Victorian homes in it, a lot of old pecan trees. And it's the kind of home that probably most of us grew up in, and fortunately, I still get to live in one. You get to probably visit one on occasion, but it's the way of life that those people like and that's the way they want it to continue.

Their delegation is here today because they're concerned about the traffic congestion in their community and what it is doing to their quality of life. They believe that a bypass is absolutely essential, if they are to have efficient and safe traffic flow and if they're to have a legitimate bargaining tool with which to achieve economic growth.

As I visited with some of the members of the delegation, I discovered that there are some people in this group who you normally would expect to oppose any type of bypass. They're owners of businesses who without any doubt will feel some results of decreased traffic, but the members of this group are forward thinking who believe that it is absolutely essential to remove some pass-through traffic through the downtown area and from the residential area downtown.

The group's spokesman is Mark Kloster, and Mark is the general manager, heir apparent of the 107-year-old Dr. Pepper Bottling Company in Dublin; it is the oldest Dr. Pepper plant in the world. And this plant, which is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Central Texas, draws a significant number of visitors because of its location on Highway 377/67 in downtown Dublin.

Mark's vision for Dublin, like the rest of the delegation, is to help Dublin grow in an organized and manageable way. As a strong proponent of economic development, he's convinced that a bypass is badly needed and that a strong marketing effort on the part of the downtown businesses will compensate for any potential loss of drive-through traffic.

As state representative for that area, I've had the opportunity to get acquainted with the people of Dublin, including most of the task force members that are here today. They're people with vision who are proud of their community, and they want to see it prosper. I believe you'll hear some persuasive remarks today concerning the necessity of a relief bypass and the justification to move it forward as quickly as possible.

Candidly, this is an area -- I represent four counties, and it is a situation where we're just looking at Dublin. On the other hand, myself and Senator Sibley -- who represents, obviously, a larger area -- this is an area-wide -- because of the unique location of Tarleton and some other institutions around there, it's a unique situation that involves area-wide. Because it's an area-wide need, I think it's essential that you look at it seriously.

Again, Mr. Kloster is normally a person that you think would be against this based on his relationship with the Dr. Pepper Plant and the fact that he is going to be potentially affected by this, but I think it speaks volumes that he loves this community enough, and if you think he's a salesman, you should probably meet his grandfather, who is here. But we'll let Mark come forward, but it speaks volumes about him, again, that he is looking at the best needs of his community in the long haul and the safety of his overall citizens in that area of the state.

I'll turn it over to Mr. Kloster. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Appreciate it.

MR. KLOSTER: Thank you, Allen.

Commissioners, we thank you for allowing us the opportunity to meet with you today. Our delegation is from Dublin, Texas, population of 3,100; we're located 70 miles southwest of Fort Worth in the rolling hills of Erath County. Dublin is much like other small communities in rural Texas: we take pride in our kids, in our new high school that's under construction, in our low crime rate, our churches, and our colorful heritage. We like our lifestyle and we want to preserve it.

Dublin has all the components of a Norman Rockwell painting of Main Street USA, with one exception: Dublin's main street is Highway 377/67, a noisy, dangerous, heavily traveled highway, which cuts right through our residential area and the heart of our business district.

We're grateful and relieved that the Texas Department of Transportation has a bypass on the drawing board for Dublin. We thank you for that, but we are here today to ask you to consider elevating the priority of that project. We believe we can offer some compelling reasons to do so. We also believe we can offer some reassurance from the governments of Erath County and the City of Dublin that a relief route will be supported in meaningful ways.

Highway 377/67 cuts through Dublin roughly north to south; it intersects the downtown business district with Highway 6; both highways are part of the Texas Trunk System, which means your group has already recognized their vital role in moving people and products across the state.

The Texas Department of Transportation realized many years ago the importance of 377/67 in Erath County. TxDOT also recognized that the traffic was increasing in this area so quickly that the 11-mile stretch of two-lane highway between Stephenville and Dublin would eventually be unable to meet the demands made upon it.

When TxDOT announced the Highway 377/67 widening project -- which is currently underway -- between Dublin and Stephenville, the public's reaction was, for the most part, a collective sigh of relief. Residents of both communities have been supportive, because we believe the four-lane divided highway will make travel safer and more convenient.

We applaud your effort to accomplish that. The fact that the number of protests to that project was very small would indicate that the public has recognized the need and is willing to tolerate the inconveniences associated with the actual construction in order to achieve the end result. However, this badly needed widening project between Dublin and Stephenville may actually compound the severe traffic problem which currently exists in Dublin.

When the project is complete, two things will almost certainly happen. First, many of the drivers who are using alternate routes between Dublin and Stephenville will begin to use 377/67 once again. Second, vehicles funneled from the new higher speed, four-lane highway will reach a sudden bottleneck at the Dublin city limits which is just four-tenths of a mile from the intersection at Highway 377 and Clinton Street. The result will be that traffic is suddenly slowed down and channeled into two lanes from the higher speed four-lane highway.

Picture with us the traffic problems which already exist in Erath County and also in Dublin inside the city limits. More than 100 homes, churches and businesses are located on Highway 377/67 which is Patrick Street inside the city limits. The only access to most of these homes and businesses is off of the highway. It's a lucky homeowner or business owner who has access to a side street or alleyway which makes it possible to safely move onto or off of Patrick Street.

According to information provided to us by the Texas Department of Transportation office in Stephenville, more than 900 medium and heavy-duty trucks come through Dublin every day, approximately 8 percent of the estimated 11,700 vehicles per day. Based on your own projections, we can expect the daily traffic count to increase to almost 19,000 vehicles by the year 2018, just 20 years from now.

One of the reasons our truck traffic is so heavy is a dual-edge sword. Erath County is the largest milk producing county in the state of Texas. The industry which directly and indirectly is the basis for our economy is also one which is responsible for much of the truck traffic. Raw milk must be transported to processing facilities and commodities must be brought here to meet the needs of that industry.

Most of the truck traffic now comes through downtown Dublin and often makes wide turns at the downtown traffic light. Those wide turns, by the way, are often occasionally achieved after a backup-and-try-again effort.

Another complicating factor is the delivery of mobile homes from two major manufacturing facilities, Granbury on Highway 377 and Cleburne on Highway 67, to any point southwest of Dublin. These wide loads frequently stall traffic at the downtown intersection, occasionally requiring police assistance for traffic control.

In a recent incident, regular traffic was rerouted by police for almost three hours as a wide load which was headed north from south Texas oil refineries, completely shut down one of the two lanes of Highway 377/67 in downtown Dublin. On another occasion, a wide load was diverted through a major residential area to avoid the downtown traffic light.

We are inconvenienced by the traffic congestion; sometimes we're downright mad about it, but we're also worried about the safety of our school children. The school superintendent is so concerned that he met recently with representatives of your Department to ask for a flashing light at the intersection of Mesquite Street and Highway 377 where a large number of students cross twice each day.

We've been fortunate so far. In spite of the large number of traffic accidents within the city limits, no school child has been seriously injured in a pedestrian accident.

And on the subject of safety, please note that Dublin has no hazardous materials route. Any potentially dangerous chemical moving through this area must travel through the narrow streets, through our residential areas, our downtown business district, close to a nursing home, and by our high school and junior high school campus. In addition, the heavy truck traffic, the congestion on Highway 377 is compounded by the large number of commuters who drive through Dublin en route to jobs or college in Stephenville.

Tarleton State University -- which is a part of the Texas A&M University System -- is located in Stephenville. The university has a current enrollment of 6,000 and has announced a multi-million dollar expansion, which is expected to increase the student population to 8,600 by the year 2010. Many of those students, as well as the faculty and support staff, must pass through Dublin from communities south and west every day.

Add to those numbers the numbers of the several major industries in Stephenville such as the Norton Company, FMC, and Appleton, which employ people from throughout the surrounding areas. A major expansion of one of those key industries in Stephenville would greatly increase their number of employees, and therefore the traffic.

And add to those numbers the sports enthusiasts who drive through Dublin en route to major recreational and hunting areas near Dublin. Carr Country Club and Lake Proctor attract large numbers of visitors, many towing boats and campers in the summer months. The fall season draws hundreds of birds and deer hunters from the Dallas-Fort Worth area. On Friday nights during deer season, when the hunters en route to their leases are coming through town at the same time fans are heading to football games, it's not uncommon for downtown traffic to be backed up from the downtown traffic light eight blocks north to the Clinton Street intersection.

Some local business owners are suggesting the rerouting of truck traffic only which they believe would avoid removing potential shoppers from the business district. We question where that truck route could go that would not create additional problems, particularly in the residential areas of our community.

We have also heard a suggestion that Highway 377/67 be widened to four lanes through town. That plan would require the removal of existing businesses which contribute to our economic base, and the removal of homes, which contribute to the historical and aesthetic beauty of our community.

We believe that both suggestions, a truck bypass and the widening of 377/67 through town, are ineffective, unrealistic and financially undesirable.

The knee-jerk reaction of some people has been: the bypass would kill the downtown businesses. We contend, on the contrary, that the elimination of the noise and air pollution caused by the heavy traffic, combined with the increased convenience of parking on the main street, which is now very difficult, would enhance the downtown businesses, not kill them.

It may be significant to note also that three major businesses on Highway 377 inside the Dublin city limits have recently closed. Factors which are threatening local businesses are already at work and those closings should be a wake-up call to us.

Certainly there are businesses which will be hurt. It stands to reason that certain types of businesses will be major losers, particularly those such as the Dairy Queen which, by the nature of its franchise marketing, are huge draws to people who pass through a community. But as a member of our delegation, the owner of the Dublin Dairy Queen is among the supporters of the loop because of his conviction that economic strength in a community lies in its ability to attract and retain new businesses.

And the Dublin Dr. Pepper Plant, which I represent, is the community's number one tourist attraction. But I also feel strongly that a relief route is desperately needed for the life of the downtown area.

It is probable that motels, convenience stores, and gas stations will also suffer losses. That makes it essential that the owners of those businesses work hand in hand with other businesses and organizations in our community to develop a long-range plan that would create an atmosphere in which local businesses can succeed. It is up to us to find ways to compete under the changing market conditions which will occur when the relief route becomes a reality.

Many of the people who are actively involved in economic development in our community see the bypass as a badly needed tool for attracting new business. We will gain several miles of highway frontage, which has a potential of becoming a highly visible, easily accessible industrial park, something we are currently lacking because of being landlocked.

The City of Dublin has recently formed an economic development corporation and a planning commission which will address exactly those kinds of needs. The key to their success will be to have a working plan in place before the relief route becomes a reality.

Among the members of our delegation today are officials from Erath County and the City of Dublin. While it's premature for either entity to commit to specifics, there's indication that key representatives of both groups will support the incentives to see that the Dublin relief route is moved to a Priority 2 status.

The City of Dublin has indicated it will consider assuming the maintenance of the existing highway inside the city limits after the relief route becomes a reality. And county leadership has discussed the possibility of providing additional financial incentives above the required obligation for the purchase of right of way.

In conclusion, the traffic congestion on Highway 377/67 is destroying one of the primary reasons we chose to live in Dublin in the first place: our quality of life. The heavy truck traffic and vehicle traffic, which comes straight through our town, is a threat to the safety of our children; it pollutes our air with fumes and noise; it is wearing out our city streets ahead of their time, and the tranquility which would be expected to be part of main street is gone.

We believe there are no other options. The only way to regain the quality of life which has made Dublin safe, quiet and peaceful is to build a relief route to remove the congestion from our main street. We need this proposed bypass as quickly as possible and we encourage you to consider moving the project to a Priority 2 status to achieve that end.

Thank you for allowing us this opportunity to meet with you today. It is one of grave concern to us. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Mr. Kloster. Appreciate the presentation.

Any questions of Mr. Kloster?

MR. NICHOLS: Are we going to wait for the opposing side?

MR. LANEY: Yes, why don't we do that.

MR. KLOSTER: At this time, we'd like to have Senator Sibley come up and say a few words.

SEN. SIBLEY: Thank you for the opportunity to address you, Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, Mr. Heald, Mr. Pickett. I'm here to support this. To me, this is unprecedented in my experience that this passes the Dairy Queen test.

(Laughter.)

SEN. SIBLEY: I've been working, as you know, on Highway 6 and we had problems with Calvert, Hearne, with Hempstead, Riesel, as you go down the list, and to have everybody in the downtown area come out and support this, I think, speaks to how important this is. They're totally unified behind this.

The traffic jam that you see here is also unprecedented in a town of this size, at least in the areas that I represent, and Dublin is pretty typical of the towns I have -- population of about 3,000 or less -- and to have to go through four or five light cycles to make it through an intersection is not acceptable.

I would encourage you to strike while the iron is hot. The fact that you have the whole town and the business community unified behind this, I think would indicate that it's time to go ahead and set the route and at least put it on the books, as opposed to waiting, as political tides may turn. So I would hope that you would do this and move it to Priority 2 to get this done.

The Dr. Pepper plant -- let me just take a little opportunity to plug this -- if you've not been there, it is the oldest Dr. Pepper Bottling plant, and of course, being from Waco and Baylor, we like Dr. Pepper. But you can buy it in the old bottles, which is really neat. You can go by there -- what days do y’all bottle that?

VOICE: Tuesdays.

MR. KLOSTER: Tuesdays you can go by and actually watch them do it, and it really is a fun thing to do.

At this time, I'd like to ask everybody here from Dublin who's here to support this if they would stand up. We've got the county judge of Erath County and a lot of the leadership from Dublin. Thank you very much.

At this point, I'll yield back the floor, but I do appreciate your seeing these folks here today. They're good folks and they really need this in a desperate way. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Thanks, Senator Sibley.

We do have a group signed up to speak in opposition, I believe, and I'll call on Mr. Harry Bradberry to lead off this presentation.

OPPOSITION

(Harry Bradberry, Pam Crabtree, Clifford Weible)

MR. BRADBERRY: Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. I appreciate the opportunity to come before you this morning. What I have to say is kind of like I was told in times past my eloquence and speaking ability is not too good. I think what I'm going to tell you, you can listen to and then go eat a bowl of Post Toasties and go to bed at night with nothing on your mind or stomach, either one.

(Laughter.)

MR. BRADBERRY: But what I am going to talk to you about is this right here. I'm a business owner in Dublin, Texas. My family, my dad, we've been there since the word go. We have businesses located on Highway 377/67; I have three different properties on that highway.

I hear about the unification here of the town that we want the bypass around us. I didn't get that news; in fact, the majority of the business owners I've talked to I didn't get that news. I understand priority interests that certain individuals want bypasses around town, but not necessarily for the welfare of the town, but it's for private interests.

So as a result, some of the business owners and us got together and we decided to commission a private study of our own to determine how bad this traffic congestion was, because we see it daily. So we had a traffic study made on our highway during the week of September 13 for a 24-hour period which ran from 6:00 a.m. until 6:00 a.m. the next morning.

Now, we decided that may not be fair, so we broke this down during that week over a three-day period and studied it at different times so we could get a weekly average of what the count would be. The count was divided in two groups; in other words, the first group was two-axle vehicles, being cars, trucks and light-duty pickups; the other category was in heavier equipment, what the DOT calls 26,000 GVW, gross vehicle weight -- in other words, trucks. And so we broke that study down.

Well, we didn't know anything about counting vehicles -- we ran out after we got through with ten fingers -- so we got somebody we thought did know, and Officer David Coffey is a Department of Public Safety officer that has been involved in traffic for a long time, and he's also Erath County Sheriff and -- former Erath County Sheriff. So we talked to David -- Officer Coffey and asked him if he would consider doing this for us. So he did; the traffic count was made by Officer Coffey and under his supervision, other people, that counted the traffic.

This man is an expert in the field and he's had years of experience, and the count that they made over these 24-hour periods came out that there were 7,278 two-axle vehicles -- you might say cars, just light duty stuff; there were 806 multi-axle vehicles in a 24-hour period over a week's average.

Officer Coffey, in talking to him about the traffic -- and he was there personally looking at it to see it, and he said he would be happy to testify under oath that it is a busy intersection, but my observation is that the traffic flows freely. Well, in Dublin, Texas, we have two traffic lights -- we're kind of like Mayberry. We have the traffic light we counted downtown, which does get congestion -- I'll say that there may be eight or ten cars congested in there, but in coming into Austin this morning, my nerves are still in bad shape. I don't even know what congestion we're talking about. So Officer Coffey says the traffic flows freely.

This traffic is a very valuable asset to Dublin, Texas, because every business depends on these people to some degree to come in. Now, the businesses that are affected the most heavily are going to be the ones that are going to suffer the worst, and at the same time, when they suffer and go out of business, they no longer can pay taxes; that means the rest of us are going to pick up the burden.

I was told, well, you can move out to the new bypass. Well, all that sounds great, but we're in the feed and fertilizer business, and I don't know how many feed mills you ever picked up and tried to move; we can't move.

And you think, well, why would you be affected by any of that. Well, Highway 377/67 is a main artery to the

deer country. Out of the Metroplex, the deer hunters come through down 377. We have worked diligently for many years to attract deer hunters to stop with us. To be real honest with you, and this doesn't sound like a very strong selling point, but we've got a nice clean restroom, and when you leave out of Fort Worth, Texas going to deer country, it's time to stop when you get there. So we can trap the deer hunters and sell them corn and the other amenities that they buy. So it's certainly going to be an economic liability if that bypass goes around.

Now, our primary interest, of course, is the safety of our citizens. We don't want to demean that in any area. At the same time, we want to maintain the aesthetic quality of our beautiful town, to the point that on the holidays we line 377 with American flags, every house, all the way through. Why? We want to say to that traffic coming through, we appreciate you, and that we, at the same time, are certainly patriotic in what we do.

But as far as the safety of our citizens, as far as disrupting the aesthetic atmosphere in any area, they represent no threat whatever. In fact, traffic counts back in the early '80s was over 7,000, so it's not been that many additional vehicles that are coming through, and we have successfully handled that traffic all the time.

The vigor that's being exerted to expedite a loop stems from private interest groups and does not represent the welfare of this community. Spending in excess of $20 million -- in fact, I read in the paper $23 million -- spending in excess of $23 million of hard-earned taxpayer money to bypass 1.9 miles -- and that's the distance from city limit to city limit -- of a little old country town of 3,000 people, where when a traffic expert -- our own Officer Coffey makes the statement that the traffic flows freely, my friends, it's not to the taxpayers' best interests. So as a taxpayer, I would certainly suggest that this not be done; as a business owner, I would urge and plead that this not be done. The main reason is that that bypass is not needed around Dublin, Texas.

I appreciate the time you've given me this morning. If I could answer any questions, I'm just tickled to death. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Mr. Bradberry.

Pam Crabtree.

MS. CRABTREE: Good morning and greetings from the merchants of downtown Dublin along Highway 377 specifically.

I did a survey before the meeting in Dublin with the Highway Department and contacted every business that I could get at that time, and I have a copy of the signatures that represent over 35 businesses, and these people all said that they depend upon the traffic of 377 to maintain their business and to be profitable.

I own the Golden Butterfly Jewelers in downtown Dublin, a half block from the red light. I've been there 26 years; I see the traffic daily.

The incident that Mark mentioned about the tie-up in traffic for three hours, there was one thing they could have done, I've seen them do it many times on tall equipment: they get on top of it, they raise the light up, at the next intersection the blinking light, and they go on. In the end, that's what they did, after tying it up for three hours. So that's not the problem on our traffic. Maybe sometimes I ought to get out there when I see a problem and say, Hey, this is what they did last time.

But it's important to us that the traffic go through Dublin. All right, so we have a lot of trucks. I still say there's a truck route, there's other alternatives than to bypass the whole town.

We have 24 merchants who are located in the city limits who are against this: there's two motels, four convenience stores, seven eating places, and ten retail businesses, and a couple of wholesale suppliers. And we're very concerned about our livelihood. We have our hopes and our dreams tied up in our businesses. We have seen many, many small towns where the highway bypasses the town, and those are not vibrant towns anymore; their downtown districts are dead.

When the highway is completed between Dublin and Stephenville, I think a lot of our traffic will -- that will solve a lot of the problems, because if you take a highway count on the outside of Dublin going toward Comanche, it's not near as crowded. But the traffic stops at Dublin -- that's where a lot of it originates -- it goes down Highway 6 and it turns, so a bypass is not going to address some of our problems already there.

Coming into Dublin, we do not go down to just two lanes, we have a center turn lane all the way to the first red light. There is room for a center turn lane from that red light all the way through the rest of town; it's been measured according to what is available over at Stephenville where they have several main streets with a center turn lane. We have enough feet to do that.

So there are other alternatives, and this group does not speak for Dublin. They may be our bankers that do not back us, and they may be our representatives, but they don't speak for the merchants of Dublin.

I thank you for listening to us today, and before they spoke for us, they should have contacted us and listened to what we had to say. And I think there needs to be a study to see what other alternatives, because there are other alternatives. And so this should not be priority at this time, with the traffic like it is and with our population like it is. So thank you for your consideration.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Ms. Crabtree.

Clifford Weible.

MR. WEIBLE: I'll make mine real short. Our main concern too is when we're sitting there in our businesses and we watch the traffic daily, I would say the biggest part of the time there is no problem at all. There is some, however, like on Fridays, special holidays -- not every holiday, but hunting seasons opening days, but that's a very minute percentage compared to a 24-hour, 365-day a year type scenario.

We had an aerial photo of this, and this is on Friday at 11:00 a.m., give or take ten minutes. But anyway, as you can see, the traffic isn't heavy at this particular time -- which I haven't looked at their pictures over here, but I'm sure that they picked a real busy time, but at 11:00 a.m. there was no congestion on there whatsoever, and this is the way it is pretty much the biggest percentage of the time which it would be 80 to 90 percent, in our estimation.

And that's all I have. Thank you for listening.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Mr. Weible. Appreciate the presentations on both sides of this particular issue.

Questions, comments?

MR. NICHOLS: I have two or three. Number one, I think both parties, the ones that are proposing this and the ones that are here in opposition to this, need to be aware that about six months ago I added up the construction that is scheduled on 67, from Brownwood all the way to the Metroplex, and it's about $100 million of construction scheduled on that route to increase that route for traffic. The state has identified that route as one that is a primary artery for the area; it's going to be more and more trucks, more and more cars on it, so you should be aware of that, if you're not.

Number two, I don't know if this is to Mark Kloster or who, but I think there was an indication that the city would take over the highway inside the city limits if the relief route was built -- I mean, you had indicated that. Has the city taken a position, the City of Dublin, the city council actually voted a resolution either to support or oppose?

MR. KLOSTER: No, sir. We have had preliminary discussions with members of the city council, and in talking to some of those members, they have shown some support of perhaps taking over the maintenance of that road once the relief route becomes a reality. And they have not passed a resolution, and to the best of my knowledge, have not even had an agenda item on it at this point.

MR. NICHOLS: I know so often the Department gets in a situation where if we do a project like this in a community, to some groups we're considered shoving the project down the community's throat; if we do not do the project, in many instances we're considered ignoring the problem. And city councils in a lot of situations don't want to take a position and vote a resolution of support or opposition to a project like this. I know; I came from a city, I was a councilman and mayor.

But it is very important that your community, through its local elected officials like the city council, actually take a stand, make their own conclusions, and pass a resolution one way or the other, in my opinion. I think that it's very helpful and it's very fair to both parties in the community.

Also, the relief route, I believe, probably goes outside the city limits

MR. KLOSTER: That is correct.

MR. NICHOLS: Which means it's in the county. You might even consider, either side, going to your county elected officials, or that precinct, or whatever it may be in your area, and have that next level of local elected officials take a stand. That's a very fair thing to do. I can certainly understand why they would probably not like to do that, but I think it's probably a good thing for you to do.

There is a lot of construction scheduled along that route; it's going to get busier and busier.

I appreciate the concerns of both sides; it's one we see often. That's really all I had.

MR. LANEY: Thanks, Robert, for the comments.

Anne, any questions?

MS. WYNNE: No.

MR. LANEY: I don't have any questions. I think Mr. Nichols' points were well taken, and I'm sympathetic to both sides of the equation. I do think we're going to see a rise in traffic that's going to be fairly significant.

Anne?

MS. WYNNE: I would like to ask that the staff, when they're working with the community -- we have examples of cities where relief routes have been put in place and downtown businesses have thrived. Like the Dairy Queen example, that's one of the classic ones where they do know to pick up and move. And we can do certain things about what kind of businesses we allow on the frontage roads, as far as keeping hotels inside. I'm not quite sure what those rules are, but we do have some examples where relief routes have worked in communities, and so when we're working with this community, let's take them through some of those and show what the process was and how they worked.

MR. LANEY: I think that's a good point. There are ways to limit access and protect the downtown, and Anne is right on target in terms of her comments, as was Robert with respect to a clearer read from the elected officials of the community. I think that's an important step, if in fact there's a way to get them to act. You might have to wait until after November to do that, but we're not going to build anything in the next 60 days anyway.

We appreciate the response. As you know, the pattern is we will take a careful look at it. We'd like to hear back from you on this, along the lines of what Robert has raised, and hopefully we can move this thing forward in a way that the community can get comfortable with and businesses can feel protected if we go with the route, or somehow or other we manage to create a flow of traffic that doesn't exist right now, and is going to get a little bit more aggravated as we move forward with higher traffic levels.

We're going to recess for five minutes now and allow the next delegation to move in. And those from Dublin who made the effort to come down here, we appreciate it very much, big effort. Thanks.

(Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)

METROPORT CITIES

(Mayor Rick Stacy, Mayor Ron Lee, Gary Fickes, Sen. Jane Nelson)

MR. LANEY: Let's reconvene the Commission meeting, and our fourth and final delegation this morning is next. And a reminder that we are trying to limit presentations to 20 minutes, so we'd appreciate your trying to adhere to that schedule.

We've got a problem, though. I looked at the map trying to find Metroport, and it is nowhere on the map, and to qualify to speak, you have to be somewhere on the state map, but I understand that that will be pointed out to us somewhere along the way.

Actually, we are very familiar with this issue in these areas. We had a chance to visit with a number of folks yesterday and today, and look very much forward to hearing the presentation from the Metroport Cities to discuss two projects on 114 and one project on US 377.

Let me call on Mayor Rick Stacy from the City of Southlake to lead off this presentation. Mayor Stacy, welcome.

MAYOR STACY: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, Mr. Heald, Mr. Behrens, Mr. Pickett. Good morning. I'm Rick Stacy, mayor of the City of Southlake and chairman of the Metroport Cities Partnership. We want to thank you for once again giving the Metroport Cities Partnership the opportunity to come and speak before this Commission.

Our delegation today includes more than 100 people. Most of our group left really, really early this morning and caught buses to ride here. So with your permission, I'd like to acknowledge them and ask our delegation to stand at this time. Thank you all for coming.

Today, Mr. Ron Lee, the mayor of Keller, Mr. Gary Fickes, the chairman of the Metroport 114 Group, and Senator Jane Nelson will be speaking to you. We also have a video presentation which illustrates the continued growth and the economic success in our part of the Metroplex and the ever increasing demands on our present highway system.

The Metroport Cities Partnership consists of eight cities, two counties, four school districts, chambers of commerce, businesses, public utilities, and over a half million residents along the corridor between DFW Airport and the Alliance Airport.

Our delegation is made up of the corridor's elected officials, representatives from the business community, residents and economic development groups. We're a very diverse group, because the 114 corridor serves a diverse traveling public whose lives and businesses depend on transportation.

Two years ago, we came here and expressed to you how important Highway 114 is to the Metroport region and to the economic success of the State of Texas. You responded very favorably, and we're proud that 114 progress is moving ahead. Today we'd like to reflect back on those sentiments just briefly and also to express to you not only how important Highway 114 improvements are, but the importance of improving the state arterials that support Highway 114.

At this time, I'd like to introduce Mr. Ron Lee, the mayor of Keller.

MAYOR LEE: That's Metroport. Thank you, and as Mayor Stacy stated, State Highway 114 is very important to the Metroport corridor. It is the lifeline for the northwest Metroplex, being the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Economic development, education, people's everyday lives depend on the best transportation system we can provide. In 1996, the Metroport Partnership gave you a very detailed overview of the economic growth and the impact of the corridor. In the last two years, That growth has not only continued but outstripped any projections we have made ten years or even a few years ago.

Tarrant County has the most housing starts in all of Texas in 1997; in the last ten years, the population of Keller has nearly doubled to over 22,000 residents; our sales tax receipts have quadrupled; and our property values have exceeded a billion dollars. This same story you would hear from other towns and cities along the Metroport 114 corridor.

In Mayor Stacy's city, Southlake, the population has tripled in the last ten years; the property values have quadrupled to over $1-1/2 billion.

Over $6 billion has been invested in the corridor by the private sector. Leveraged by public investments of only $140 million, this $6 billion has helped to create new jobs and a world class workforce. These investments have helped develop leading edge scientific and trade research, to fund new schools, and create opportunities for all of the residents of the Metroport 114 corridor, Dallas-Fort Worth, and the citizens of Texas.

All this growth can be attributed to the transportation system we have, the 114 corridor between DFW and Fort Worth Alliance Airport. As Mayor Stacy mentioned, the 114 Freeway program is moving forward, as you've continued to commit your limited funds to see this program through, and we are getting there. The bypass around Roanoake is almost complete; the other segments are funded and under development. Now there are only two missing links left to commit near-term construction funding: for Dove Road to Carroll School Road, and from State Highway 170 to Precinct Line Road.

All of the right of way has been acquired and the utilities are relocated between Precinct Line Road and State Highway 170. This was accomplished at no cost to the State in 1991 by a public and private partnership led by Hillwood Development. The Fort Worth District has diligently acquired right of way for the sections of State Highway 114 between Dove Road and Carroll School Road. Based on the data from the district, all the right of way has been acquired and the design is underway and the funding could be let for construction as early as January of 2001.

International trade truck traffic on and off 170 is dramatically increasing and is impacting the safety and the efficiency of our traveling public through this portion of 114. Congestion through signalized intersections in Southlake, Trophy Club, and Westlake is staggering the quality of life for those cities and jeopardizing their economic development into the future.

But now with your assistance, we close the gap in the Metroport 114 Freeway corridor and we can turn our attention to the system that supports 114. US 377 is a vital north-south arterial that is very strategic to feeding the traffic on and off of 114 and Highway 170. Not only that, but US 377 is our main street, the center of business and commerce for Keller. Mostly two lanes, with some widening done as part of the 170 and the 114 bypass, it is congested and unsafe. We even have signs that tell drivers not to drive or pass on the few areas with shoulders, yet this unsafe practice continues.

Heaviest during the rush hours, but throughout the day, traffic on Highway 377 comes to a standstill. To get on or off Highway 377 is increasingly dangerous due to the high volume of heavy equipment, construction, semi-tractor trailers, and commuter traffic, all seeking to go through Keller to get to 170 and 114. Many citizens of our town will not use US 377; thus staying away from the heart of their own community, our main street.

The partnership is very pleased to present you the materials now being passed out that we have put together with an exhibit highlighting our regional system and the State Highway 114 and US 377 improvements we are requesting. The long exhibit shows all of the Department's planned and underway 114 improvements from 1709, and the improvements we are proposing for State Highway 170 through Precinct Line Road.

The Partnership has put together a video that continues the story of Metroport 114 corridor and US 377 and they're importance to the economic future of Texas. We would like to show you this video now. Thank you for your consideration and your time.

(Whereupon, the video was shown.)

MAYOR STACY: Our next speaker is a record-holder -- sort of like Sammy Sosa or Mark McGwire -- who has hit home runs for our community, served as mayor for seven years, a record that will never be broken.

(Laughter.)

MAYOR STACY: Presently, he is the chairman of the 114 Committee and he's our foreign ambassador to Mexico and Japan. Please welcome Gary Fickes.

MR. FICKES: Thank you, Mayor Stacy. As he said, I'm Gary Fickes and I'm the former mayor of Southlake, and I think today is probably my fifth opportunity to appear before you as part of the Metroport delegation.

Since 1987, I've been a partner with the Metroport corridor towns and cities and with the Texas Department of Transportation in furthering this developing along State Highway 114. The Department has always favorably responded to the Metroport corridor's requests. One reason is that it's very clear that the investments in this corridor have reaped enormous rewards for the residents, the businesses and the State of Texas. As Mayor Lee had said earlier, with your participation of $150 million in public funds, we've been able to attract over $6 billion to this corridor.

We are very close to seeing 114 Freeway completed in this corridor. The last missing pieces are Highway 170 and Dove Road, and what this will mean to the traveling public, the commuters, the freight shippers, employers, and our school children will be a safe, efficient roadway.

I'm very proud to have been part of the 114 improvement program that has seen Southlake contribute over $2 million so far to right of way acquisition and tens of thousands of dollars toward environmental and engineering studies, and also $1 million toward the construction of the Kimble Road interchange.

As part of the earlier 114 and 170 projects, the Metroport communities have spent millions of dollars in engineering and right of way, and local property owners have donated right of way and funded utility relocations to ensure that future improvements to 114 between 170 and Precinct Line could be made at minimal cost to the State.

Well, that future is now. Now it's time for the other needs of the corridors to be taken care of. The Metroport corridor cities and towns each have their own economic lifelines that sustain their communities and provide vital links to Highway 114. Keller and Roanoake rely on US 377 as their main street, and that road is incredibly important as a north-south connector to 114.

Tarrant County and Keller would provide 10 percent of the right of way cost as part of the local match for this project.

Included in the notebook that was passed out earlier, we have included the letters and resolutions of support from our local officials, the business community, and residents along 114 and 377. These are projects everyone in this corridor wants and supports. We are very committed to moving 114 and 377 programs forward and completing our regional transportation system.

On behalf of our entire delegation, I want to thank you, and it's my privilege at this time to introduce our state senator, Senator Jane Nelson. And if you have any questions after Senator Nelson speaks, we'll be happy to answer them. Senator Nelson.

SEN. NELSON: Thank you.

Chairman Laney and Commissioners Nichols and Wynne, it is a real treat to be here. I was delighted to see so many individuals from my district make the trip down to Austin to plead their case before you, and it is a pleasure for me to be here as well.

You've heard so much about the needs of this area. I know that you all have heard a lot about the needs of the entire state. I, as state senator representing a vibrant, growing area, hear a lot of needs, but I can tell you that the effort that these cities have made in joining together to present their case and to show the commitment of the entire segment of communities along 114, I think makes a very positive, powerful statement.

All of our stake holders, the top Fortune 100 and 200 companies shipping millions of tons of goods internationally, employees, residents, and the school children who ride our school buses all deserve the finest transportation system we can provide. It makes sense for the region, it makes sense for the state.

I think that the video presentation -- and I will sign autographed copies afterwards.

(Laughter.)

SEN. NELSON: I think the presentation and our speakers today have said it best: Continuing growth and the need for a regional transportation system to handle it.

Your previous investments in the 114 corridor have helped put us on the map, and if we need to have a bill to show Metroport on the map of Texas, we probably can arrange for that next session. Your investments in the 114 corridor have helped put us on the map and for our economic future and the state, we need to stay put on the map.

One important point that wasn't mentioned in the video that is important for you to know as you make this decision is that our MPO, through their 1998 Partnership Program with TxDOT, has pledged $4 million of STP funds toward the construction of Highway 114 between Dove Road and Carroll School Road. I think this clearly shows that every one of our region's elected officials wants to help and supports eliminating the bottlenecks that we have experienced on 114.

The Metroport Cities communities are working hand in hand to do their part to complete the 114 Freeway and to improve State Highway 377. Please, let's work together to protect the investments that we've all made to create opportunities for the future, continue your participation in this very critical infrastructure program.

I thank you very much, and I'd like to thank all the people who took their time today to come down. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Senator Nelson.

A couple of comments and questions, and somebody may be able to answer them. First of all, we had a delegation from Nocona, Texas, promoting boots, but I have not heard yet, as the gentleman said, this 114 and the Metroport described as the Yellow Brick Road yet. I'm expecting ruby slippers from the state senator.

MS. WYNNE: You will look really cute in those ruby slippers.

(Laughter.)

MR. LANEY: I'm not going to wear them.

The projects, as I understand it, that you all are proposing, ordinarily -- and I don't know that this is much of a different case -- really don't get our attention unless there is some contribution and some leveraging from the communities involved. Is there? Maybe I missed it in the presentation. Is there a leverage factor or a contribution from the --

MAYOR STACY: As Senator Nelson pointed out, there's a $4 million commitment from --

MR. LANEY: Okay. I’m sorry.

MAYOR STACY:  -- COG, and there's over $3 million from the City of Southlake. I mean, we've spent $2 million already and there's another million committed. So I think that has to do with the Kimble Road interchange, but just so you know, the city is participating.

MR. LANEY: Okay. Comments?

MR. NICHOLS: Yes, I had a couple of comments. Number one, I wanted to also, as Chairman Laney said, thank all of you for taking the time to come here. I realize how difficult it is to get up early in the morning and come down, and to have as many people as are here today to support this is very significant, and I want to compliment you for that. I think you did a great job on that. It's very meaningful to us too, I will tell you.

Number two, I wanted to point out that several months ago Senator Nelson invited myself and our Executive Director Wes Heald up there. She's very committed to the transportation in that area; she wanted to make sure we were there, and showed us the projects, specifically some of these areas, and managed to time it where we hit 5:30 traffic, I think. It was a coincidence, she said. I had a hard time getting home. But I did want to make sure I pointed that out. It was very helpful, so we appreciate the invitation up.

And as Chairman Laney was saying, it is very important for a community to partner or leverage or bind this thing with us. We have so many communities around the state who want us to commit money to important projects. It's a very easy thing to want something and support it when it's someone else's money; it's a totally different thing when a part of it is your own money. And when a community makes that decision to have a vested interest in a project, that tells us that that community knows it's important and has gone through the steps for that support, and the local leaders are willing to step up to the plate.

So I wanted to make sure that you understood that that was a very significant thing.

We had a good day yesterday going over the project with some of your people. That's really all.

MS. WYNNE: I just wanted to say congratulations to this group. I think I'm the only one who was here before there was a Metroport, or you all knew you were the Metroport. Because you do come from the city that has more mayors per square foot in Texas.

(Laughter.)

MS. WYNNE: So you all have done a really great job of bringing all of these communities together and agreeing on what projects are important to you, and then getting behind each other's projects and trying to make them work.

I don't know if you all were here at the beginning of the meeting when Chairman Laney talked about the fact that we do have more federal money coming into the state -- that's the good news. The bad news is that we need more state money to help us leverage that federal money, so local contributions are going to be ever more meaningful.

And when you hear people talk about the surplus that we have and giving it back to the people of Texas, I hope that you all will remember your highway projects and know that we cannot get these built if we give this money back to people in our communities; it only works in big bulks and it takes big chunks of money to build these projects. So give the money to the teachers and give the money to our highways, to our infrastructure projects.

I just wanted to ask a question as far as Project 2 and Project 3, are those numbered in order of wishes? The group doesn't have a preference? I think you're going to be happy with what happens to Project Number 1, so I'm just wondering where you are on if 3 were to become 1 or 2 were to become 1.

MAYOR STACY: We wouldn't bring you anything that was not a top priority.

MS. WYNNE: And as between the two, you just love them both so much. Right?

(Laughter.)

MAYOR STACY: Yes, ma'am. And I would remind the Commission that not only have we participated monetarily, all of the right of way is committed, taken care of on all three of these projects.

MS. WYNNE: Right. And we appreciate that.

MAYOR STACY: We have participated actively in that too.

MS. WYNNE: It's just a part of growing up: you know, once you become a big city, then you get treated like the big metropolitan areas, and all those Fortune 100 and 200 companies have to be good citizens and help figure out how to get this infrastructure in place.

MR. LANEY: Thanks, Anne.

I want to add a couple of things. First of all, I need to digress for a moment and express my appreciation to Ronnie Kendall who brought my attention and focus on that this morning. She was accompanied by Debra Edmondson and Curtis Hawk. They took the time to sit down with me and really sort of helped bring into focus the importance -- I knew it was important, but to help focus this, not just this go-round but what may be coming down the road in terms of additional needs. I appreciate that very much.

This area of the state is one of probably less than a handful of areas of the state that face the kinds of challenges in the volume and magnitude of the challenges you face. Those other areas of the state also, like you, have enormous opportunities if you take advantage of them, and if there was ever an opportunity for us to play a role in helping you take advantage of the kinds of opportunities that are presenting themselves, it looks like now is the time, as far as I'm concerned.

To reiterate a little bit what Mr. Nichols was saying, I don't think we would even be considering these projects seriously were it not for your contribution and willingness to help us leverage these projects. That is, any way you slice it, the greatest measure of a community's interest in these kinds of projects. And we see it and we know how important and interested you are in moving these things forward, and we share your interests and I think that, in a way, is the ticket to help us move the thing forward, so we appreciate that.

I regret one thing: that if we do move forward on these projects, it will not be nearly as exciting a ride between gravel trucks moving northwest on 114, and I know you all will miss that, along with me.

(Laughter.)

MR. LANEY: But I hope we can move forward and relieve a little bit of the stress on the roads and on the humans that travel those roads. But I think it's a terrific opportunity for us to move forward together. The presentation was right on target; I appreciate it; and let's see what we can get done. Thank you very much.

We're going to take a five-minute recess and allow you all to move.

(Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)

P R O C E E D I N G S (RESUMED)

MR. LANEY: The meeting is reconvened. We're going to take the Open Comment Period out of order with respect to an issue relating to the bridge in Llano, and I think I would like to lead off by inviting Representative Bob Turner to introduce those who might be speaking, and we're glad to have you here.

REP. TURNER: Chairman Laney, thank you. I do represent Llano County in the legislature in District 73. I think we only have two people who really wish to speak, and I'll simply let them introduce themselves, I think.

I would like to have the group stand, the ones who aren't already standing, from Llano and be recognized. Would you do that? Thank you.

And we appreciate the opportunity to present our issue to the Commission today. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Appreciate your comments, and before you get started with your speakers, let me just express our appreciation on the part of the Commission and the Department for the effort that it takes to abandon your town -- lord knows what's happening there now; this looks like most of Llano.

(Laughter.)

MR. LANEY: But to abandon your town and join us for this session, it's clearly an issue of some importance to you, so we're looking forward to hearing from you.

Senator Troy Fraser.

MR. SCOTT: Mr. Chairman, obviously I am not Senator Fraser. He is due on the ground at Austin Airport at 12:30, so if I could ask for your indulgence, he will be here to offer comments at that time.

MR. LANEY: Absolutely.

MR. SCOTT: Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Jeff Hopf. Just for the benefit of our reporter, if you will introduce yourself and who you represent.

MR. HOPF: My name is Jeff Hopf, I'm a businessman in Llano, former elected official there. I've been asked by the group to speak in regards to this, and I appreciate the opportunity to be here, and there's a few things that we'd like to address. I think you've touched on that briefly: the issue of the bridge and the bypass in Llano.

We have a community that's very divided on this issue. There's been a lot of articles, letters to the editor -- which I brought you a copy of our local paper of which you can see you've made our headlines which is a pretty big event in our town. We chartered a bus to come here.

Our main concern, I would think, is our bypass, as witnessed by our ribbons. We believe it will be a definite detriment to our community. We understand that there's money available for bridge construction; rumors have been that there is no money for any right of way which I hope there is not. I also hope that you understand that that would be a very unpopular decision in our community.

My definition of bypass means that there's a problem, and I want to make this statement very clear: we do not need, nor do we want, any type of bypass of our community in Llano.

I have some figures also. In March of '95, the city council and the citizens were wise enough to pass an economic development sales tax, and in that period of time, we have seen tremendous strides in our community. For example, prior to March of '95, our 1993 sales tax revenue from the comptroller's office was around 333,000; in 1995 to '97 it's gone to over half a million dollars.

And I believe the real estate people that are represented here will tell you the old adage about location, location, location. We don't want you to relocate our whole town, and that's basically what we're looking at.

The Llano Economic Development Commission is also -- I have an advance copy of a study that was done by the firm of Global Vantage, and I want to just show this to you. It's a potential economic impact on Llano of a highway bypass, and I highlighted some things on here, and the very first sentence of this says, "Common wisdom is that a bypass is lethal to small towns." And some other areas that they touched on is: "A recovery, if it happens, is a 15- to 20-year process."

Now, I'm going to revert back to some comments that were made earlier in some of the minutes that I've received from the past meeting in August that Judge Gammage made about driving back from LaGrange he stopped in the town and it appeared that the thriving downtown communities were very well intact. Well, it just so happens that in this study that the Economic Development Board had arranged for, one of the towns they studied was LaGrange, and I'd like to touch on some of those points that were made in this study.

One of those was that they took the retail sales, they took the projected retail sales prior to the bypass and they took the actual sales after the bypass -- which has been eleven years since then. And these figures were state normalized which means a lot of times we get the impact of the economy of the state rather than the economy of the town itself, and so these figures take into consideration that. The projected taxable retail sales were missed by 160 percent; they're down $72 million, and I don't really believe that that falls under the term "thriving downtown community."

The population of Llano is a rural population. We have to survive on our tourist trade; that is our bread and butter. We're proud of our community. I think Commissioner Wynne stated about the mayors per square mile. We have a few of them here present today from our community, and we're very proud of our community and we want to keep our community growing, but we can't do so if the traffic flow that we count on goes somewhere else.

My office is right on the main road which will be the intersection of the joining of 71 and 29. I don't say that we have a big problem there, but my business is such where I meet people that come to our town every day, and I can't help but ask them why they're here, and they say they're here because we have a beautiful community. And we'd like to keep it that way. Thank you very much for your time.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, Mr. Hopf.

MS. WYNNE: Could we get a copy of that report on the economic impact?

MR. HOPF: I don't see a problem with that.

MS. WYNNE: Good. Thank you.

MR. HOPF: It's nothing secret. Thank you very much.

MR. LANEY: This is a speaker against the bypass as well, Mr. Henry Buttery. I may have the last name wrong.

MR. BUTTERY: I have a hardware store in Llano, have spent all my life there, except for some time in the Marine Corps and at Texas A&M.

First of all, I would like to say that for an individual who knows very little about how an operation like the Transportation Commission works, I've been greatly impressed with the quality of the people I've come in contact with. I always manage to call the wrong one first, and inevitably they were nice and they explained who I should get hold of, and then I got answers when I did get to the right place. It makes me a little bit jealous that I can't do that with my own business.

Because this is a very important thing to the Llano community, as you've already noted, we've had a mass turnout, and if I may, I'd like to just very quickly introduce some of the people that are here: Mr. Ross Bowman who is our mayor; Ross would no doubt be our spokesman if it were not for a throat problem. Jeff Hopf, who just spoke to you, is our former mayor. I think we have our entire city council. Could you raise your hands, please. I think we have two commissioners and a third who called in sick and he sent his wife as his stand-in. So we feel very fortunate to have their support.

We also have an Economic Development Council in Llano, and Mr. David Hawthorne, who is an undertaker, was intending to be here except he had something, and I think it's understandable why he perhaps would not be able to get through in time. We have a very active chamber of commerce in Llano, and that's headed, as president, by Mr. Marvin McBee. Marvin, could you raise your hand.

As far as the rest of the group here, it's made up of business people who actually make our town go, and in particular, we have the bank president of the Llano National Bank, Mr. David Willman.

And we have found a unanimity of interest in this thing by the entire group and we simply feel that on a macro basis that the town is doing as well as it is. There's a town of 3,000 people has a rather fragile economic ecosystem as far as commerce is concerned and we just don't want to spoil a winning combination.

Mr. Gammage did a very good job, I think, a few weeks ago in explaining the layout of Llano to you and gave you pictures, so I don't believe I have to take up your time with that. Hopefully, you can mentally picture what the town looks like.

The only thing I would take issue with Bob on is it seemed to me that he was woefully misinformed about the way the business people of the town feel. His comments were that the town was split. In reality, as far as the business part of the town is concerned, I would say it's as near unified as I've ever seen it, and without exception, the business people want to keep the highway system as it presently exists.

I don't want to pick on a really nice man, but he indicated that businesses in the know were for bypassing Llano. Frankly, I don't think that's the case at all.

It was also mentioned that we were a sleepy little town. Well, possibly so, but he certainly waked us up.

(Laughter.)

MR. BUTTERY: I'm sure you realize, from the numbers of calls and letters and faxes that have been sent in, that this is an issue that we feel very strongly about, and as a matter of fact, it's very easy to stand on the sidelines and give advice, and if you only own a home in a town, why, if it doesn't work, you can say I'm sorry about that. But if you have your money on the line like these people do and like I do, we feel it's absolutely necessary that the town continue to grow and progress as it has in the last couple of years, and you can tell from the figure given by Jeff Hopf that the town has had an exponential growth.

With that in mind, I'd like to say that we strongly support the original plan advanced by your engineers, and I have yet to see anything that you people have done that wasn't a viable program. If you put your stamp of approval on it, it works. We feel that the idea of moving the Roy B. Inks Bridge to one side, connecting two parts, putting in a new four-lane bridge across the town in its present location would solve the problems and allow us another 15 or 20 years of growth.

I do thank you very much.

MR. LANEY: Mr. Bob Gammage, Judge Gammage.

JUDGE GAMMAGE: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I've got an overhead I'd like to use, and some handouts for you, as usual.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, Commissioners. Appreciate the opportunity of being with you again. The crowd has already been recognized; we're all from Llano, pro and con -- and there are some cons here. Like Mr. Buttery said, we woke them up. Good, that's what we were trying to do; we wanted people to talk about it, think about it, and most of all, inform themselves about it, and not take a knee-jerk reaction.

I wish they'd been here earlier today to hear the people of Mineola come in and testify in favor of a bypass, to hear the people from Dublin in favor: including the chamber of commerce; including the person who runs the biggest tourist business in town, the Dr. Pepper Plant; and a person who runs one of those little convenience businesses, the Dairy Queen, who knows he's going to be affected but knows it's best for the town that they not destroy their community in order to accommodate a whole lot of through traffic that brings hazards with it. Hazardous materials go through their school zones.

You've seen what happens with Llano. If you look at that picture there, it comes out of Texas Highways magazine, four years ago. That picture is the Llano bridge that we're talking about, the Roy B. Inks Bridge. It's the centerpiece of a 12-page article in Texas Highways. Business started booming in Llano after that article came out. It came out in October '94; business picked up and it's still picking up.

I think the magazine is probably not solely responsible for it, but I think it's at least partially responsible for it, because if you read that article, you can see where it sells the town pretty good.

In there you will also see in the pocket a map of the city of Llano, and you'll see highlighted in yellow the school zones that all of those vehicles go through. Those are the schools: elementary, junior high, and high school. It goes through the population center of town, past the historic square. There's another map in there of a walking tour of our historic square, that little yellow sheet.

And you want to run more 18-wheelers through there, you want to tear out that bridge and put in a four-lane concrete slab so more 18-wheelers can come through and be more disruptive. That's not going to attract a lot of tourists, I don't believe.

I'm not necessarily in favor of the bypass. You'll see that handout after the article from Texas Highways magazine, letters to the editor, articles from the newspaper, some fact advertisements that we have put in that paper to try to get people to think, to look, to examine for themselves, and that's all we've ever asked.

A group of citizens were alerted to the fact that this was almost a done deal. It was greased, and we realized it wouldn't be good for our community, and this included business people, some with businesses and buildings on the square; some of them helped pay for these ads.

The business community is divided. Now, maybe we should have rented a bus like Mr. Buttery did and hauled them all over here; we didn't do that.

What we want is facts and information. Commissioner Wynne, earlier you mentioned some information, some data that TxDOT has in its possession, the commissioners have in their possession, relating to the experience of small towns. I think it's when the City of Dublin was in here, you wanted to share that information with them. And Mineola has done its own studies. You wanted to share that information with them, and I hope you will share it with us as well, because we need to know this before we make up our minds. We need to make informed decisions, thoughtful decisions, and that's basically all we're asking.

It's good to see these folks out. I hope they do start reading and informing themselves and thinking about it. The reason this citizens group got active is because two years ago the city was presented with three alternatives: tear out the old bridge, put a new four-lane slab in, maybe move it to the side; put a loop of Highway 16 that connects Fredericksburg and Llano and San Saba around the city which would divert all traffic away from town -- no one has suggested that.

It was pretty coercive, because it said we'll do that and then you can take responsibility for the bridge. Well, wait a minute, your own practice and standard procedures are the city doesn't take responsibility for it unless the city agrees to it. Isn't that correct? You can't shove it down their throats; your own practices don't permit that.

Mr. Hopf said we have a great town and we'd like to keep it that way. That's exactly right. We have studies that we've looked at from Texas A&M -- Mr. Buttery's alma mater provided for us -- Transportation Institute: "Research Results Digest of the National Cooperative Highway Research Program." I think it's got a little more credibility than a PR group that comes up with a slogan that "Llano is for Lovers."

I'm not going to belabor it. On the back page, there's a letter from a fellow named Frank Hanson to the editor. He poses even a fifth alternative, if you will: don't do nothing. Does traffic demand on that bridge require that you do anything to it now? You have a University of Texas study going on that you're paying for. The engineers there tell me it's a hell of a strong bridge, it's almost HS 20 now and it can be brought up with very little investment to HS 20. The geometrics do pose a problem: you can't widen it; you can't move those girders out without damaging or destroying the historical integrity of it; you might be able to elevate it a little bit.

If you want to get something wider and higher over there, then you're going to have to find a way around. Hopefully, it won't be one that funnels more 18-wheelers, more through traffic, more hazardous materials through all of our school zones, through our town square, and through our population center. We want it studied. If the bridge isn't safe, blow it up; if it is safe, let's use it, let's keep it, let's take advantage of it. It's quite a tourist attraction in itself.

Appreciate the time and the opportunity to visit with you again. I've overstayed my welcome, as usual, and I apologize for that. I'll certainly be happy to respond to any questions if you have them.

MR. LANEY: Has Senator Fraser arrived yet?

MR. SCOTT: Mr. Chairman, no, he has not; I expect him soon.

MR. LANEY: Okay. Absent Senator Fraser, I think that is the last of the speakers until he arrives, so we'll go ahead and move into any questions or comments that the Commission might have.

Anne, any comments, questions?

MS. WYNNE: I just want to tell all of you that I think it's very important that you made this trip so that both sides can have a chance to visit with us, but I want to encourage you all to go back home and see if you can't solve this problem at home, because the decisions don't need to be made in this room; they need to be made in your community.

The issue of bypasses -- which we now like to refer to as relief routes since bypass does seem to imply that something isn't working -- is a complex one for each community that faces it. Depending on the kind of economic activity that goes on in a community, the decision about whether to support it or oppose it can vary.

We did have communities in here earlier asking us for relief routes; next month we're going to have the community of Granbury, I understand, coming in and asking us for a relief route to their relief route; and then there are some communities that decide that they want to make do with the existing infrastructure.

We want to work with you, we want to provide information to everybody, regardless of how you end up coming down on this decision.

I think there was a little bit of misinformation that maybe because a group came last month, that was the reason why the meeting that was originally scheduled got rescheduled, when in fact, that meeting had been postponed before our Commission meeting took place last month, so I don't want anybody to leave the room thinking that because some people came last month, we changed what we were doing. That meeting was always going to be rescheduled, we just hadn't announced that yet. I think the meeting is in November now. Is that correct, Wes?

MR. HEALD: November 10.

MS. WYNNE: November 10. We'll give all the kinds of notice that we need to; we'll make room for everybody that wants to be heard.

And so I encourage you to go back to your community and get educated and spend as much time with the TxDOT people as you need, even if you don't call the right person the first time. We want to make sure that everybody deals with the people in our agency that they need to, and see if, as a community, you can wrestle with this problem like our other communities have and come up with a solution that works for you all.

MR. LANEY: Robert?

MR. NICHOLS: My comments are going to be very similar to Commissioner Wynne's, in that your community needs to try to work this out at home. Obviously, when you're dealing in a community like that, particularly a smaller community, feelings are very strong, sometimes they get emotional, sometimes they even get personal.

I would encourage you, on both sides, to stay open-minded, really stay open-minded, objective, look at this issue, look at some reports with other communities that have chosen to go one route or the other, and to work with your local elected officials, work with your city council. Obviously, there are a lot of city council members here. Has the city council taken a position?

AUDIENCE: Yes.

MR. LANEY: Okay.

(Inaudible speaker from audience.)

MR. LANEY: Tell you what, if you've got something to say, why don't you come on up to the microphone and introduce yourself, but why don't you please hold the comments from the audience.

MR. NICHOLS: Anyway, the state normally works very closely with a community; we do not try to shove a project down anybody's throat. We do work very -- it's very important to us, and unless there is an urgent safety factor or some overwhelming state factor that would override a community's will, it's difficult for me to see that we would do something like that.

But please try to keep an open mind on the issue, that's all I would say. And I appreciate very much the time all of you have taken to come down here today. We're a long ways away from Llano and it's a lot of inconvenience to you because of your concern on this issue. Thank you.

MR. LANEY: First of all, let me ask someone to step up to the microphone and clarify what the city council's position was, and if there is a county position on it, I'd like to know that as well.

MR. BUTTERY: If I may.

MR. LANEY: Can you come on up? Sorry to have you do that; we just need to make sure it's part of the record.

MR. BUTTERY: The city council has come down definitely in favor of keeping the highway as it is with a new bridge replacing the old bridge, and that would mean against the idea of bypassing the town.

The county commissioners have not voted. Three of the four had intended to be here this morning, and two of the commissioners are here, the one who is sick sent his wife. And we would say that when they vote, they're going to agree with the city council, but they have not voted.

MR. NICHOLS: I was going to ask a question concerning the city council meeting. First of all, was it a unanimous decision from the city council?

MR. BUTTERY: I understand it was, yes, sir.

MR. NICHOLS: Was there adequate advertisement and communication to the public of this particular issue with time for them to come together?

MS. WYNNE: If I could interrupt, I'm getting a signal from over here that perhaps a city council member is present and could give you some more accurate information.

MR. NICHOLS: Oh, great. Sure.

MR. LANEY: Could you please state your name and your position for the record.

MS. PFEISTER: Yes. My name is Patty Pfeister; I'm on the Llano City Council. It's an honor to be here before you today.

I'm sorry, what was the question?

MR. NICHOLS: On the city council, I kind of thought I heard something rumbling in the audience on some of it, but I wanted to make sure that when you did have your city council meeting on this issue, that there was adequate publicity that you were going to take that type of action.

MS. PFEISTER: We have not had a meeting on the issue; we were waiting to meet with you, we were waiting for the -- we had a meeting scheduled on September 8 as well as the public hearing on the 22nd, I believe. And the council wrote a letter to you and it was after the meetings were canceled, and it was more of a letter of concern because the meetings were canceled. I think you all got a copy of it.

We at that time had not had a meeting on it, we simply wrote the letter because of concern that the meetings were canceled because we feel, like the letter said, the taxpayers of Llano, those are the people that need to be heard. So we really have not had a meeting on this issue.

MR. NICHOLS: So you, at some point after you've had your study and talked to your people and had public hearings, will come to a conclusion.

MS. PFEISTER: Yes.

MR. NICHOLS: Are you planning to have a resolution one way or the other, or attempt to work toward that?

MS. PFEISTER: We were waiting to hear the facts, you know, the options.

MR. NICHOLS: I think you'll find out why you get paid so much for being on the city council.

(Laughter.)

MS. PFEISTER: But we were all keeping an open mind on this and we were trying not to make any decisions until we had heard from you to see what options were out there and available to us. You know, I think that there's none of us that are in favor of a bypass. Obviously, economically and socially, we feel that that would be totally devastating to us. But we were waiting to see what type -- I believe the group has come up with -- they call it an in-town solution, to see if there was a possibility of having an in-town solution on this matter, and we had planned to wait to see what you had to say, and we still are hoping to have that opportunity when you come to meet with us.

But the council is united on this issue: we do not support a bypass of any kind around our town or even a loop or whatever you want to call it, a relief. And I'm also on the LEDC board and we have written you a letter and we did have the study done.

The LEDC is going to host a meeting with the county commissioners, the chamber of commerce board of directors, the city council. It's going to be on October 6 at 7:00 p.m. at the county library, and we urge -- it's the group that did the study for us and they've also done a little more extensive study since we've talked to them, and we're asking anyone that wants to come and listen to please do so.

We are trying to educate ourselves; that's why we tried to wait. And it kind of seems like we were prompted. It kind of all snowballed on us and we were kind of prompted to come here and to write the letters.

MR. LANEY: Thank you. Appreciate the comment; that clarifies it from our standpoint.

Anne, do you want to add something more?

MS. WYNNE: [Inaudible response.]

MR. LANEY: Yes, sir. Please join us at the microphone. Sorry I didn't see you over there.

MR. DANNELLEY: James P. Dannelley, a resident of Llano, a taxpayer, et cetera.

I was at a city council meeting this past what -- I forget the date and I'm sure they will tell you that -- where a letter was addressed to this group about the bridge. I went because I am a property owner, because I was concerned, I didn't know anything about it. We were not permitted to speak; we were not permitted to ask questions, I nor any other citizen.

The item on the agenda for that evening, it seems to me, as I recall, was Item 8; they moved it up to Item 1 right quickly, passed it, and went on, and we were not allowed to address the issue. After that, I became suspicious. Thank you, sir.

MR. LANEY: Thank you, sir.

Yes, ma'am, if you will join us again at the microphone.

MS. PFEISTER: Yes, sir. Just like you did, we kind of saw the crowd and we moved the item up because the room was pretty packed -- we have a very small council room. The only thing that was on there was a letter, it was a letter that we had written. It was left at the secretary's desk; all the city council members came by, read it, approved it, signed it. And we just wanted to do it at an open meeting, just approve the letter at an open meeting. I believe that that was done on -- I can't remember the date. But it was not to be discussed and it was not on the agenda for a public hearing.

We felt that we had one side that was there prepared to speak but the other side was not, so we felt that it would not be fair at that time to -- well, we just really didn't think a letter needed public hearing. It was just a letter that expressed how we felt about the meetings being canceled and the fact that we were not for the bypass. So it really wasn't an open discussion item at that time. Does that help?

MR. LANEY: I understand. Sure, that's fine. Appreciate that.

Has Senator Fraser arrived yet? You can tell Senator Fraser when he arrives that, in fact, we moved this to earlier so he wouldn't have a chance to speak.

MS. WYNNE: That's going to be a headline in the Llano News. Don't do that, no, no, no, he didn't mean it.

(Laughter.)

MR. LANEY: He will be able to speak whenever he arrives, even if we've closed this issue and moved on, and we are looking forward to hearing from him.

Let me try to close with a couple of comments. First of all, I think anybody -- and I know Anne has been through and spent time in Llano, and I know I have; I assume Mr. Nichols will or has -- it is a terrific community you have. Truly it is one of a very few of its kind in this state, and you've got all sorts of very unique characteristics going for you, one of which is the community itself and the people.

I've heard a little bit during the morning some innuendo, at least, attributing some sort of sinister or ulterior motives to some of the positions taken that we've heard with respect to this particular item. Let me encourage you not to let this issue divide the community.

TxDOT, as you've heard from both Commissioners Wynne and Nichols, is not going to move precipitously on anything and we're not going to take any action without hearing very, very carefully and listening very carefully to the community, and oftentimes, we'll hear different signals from a community. But there is no great urgency.

You do have a few issues facing you. The bridge is functionally deficient, we would call it. Structurally, it's strong; functionally, it's a little too narrow, maybe a little too constricted from a number of standpoints. You've got some safety issues, you've got some economic opportunity and development protection issues, a lot of things working and a lot of variables. And I think we have worked well around the state on a number of occasions over a long period of time to help communities like Llano solve those kinds of problems, and I am confident that we can come to a solution that will work for most of the interests involved.

But for anybody in the city to stake out a position on an extreme side of this issue, one way or the other, is not in the best interests, ultimately long term, of the community, and I would very much caution you against that and urge you to work together and openly. And we will absolutely work with you arm and arm to move this thing forward in any particular way, shape or form you decide best suits the City of Llano.

At the end of the day, you've got something that we want to help protect, whether it's the school kids, or whether it's your downtown and the vibrancy of that, or whether it's the volumes of traffic and how they're managed as they grow over the years to come, and we have an opportunity to do it right. Nobody is rushing to conclusion on this, and we need your help and we need your guidance, but we're not going to get it and ultimately, we will be forced to take some action, unless you all can meld or shape a position that you help us learn, understand and move along with you.

So I would encourage unity on this thing, ultimately, and I would urge also some flexibility and not the rigidity that I think at least I've heard the signs of this morning. That ultimately forces us to make decisions that may not be in the maximum range of interests represented in this room and throughout the town.

So I hope that I can drive through Llano ten years from now and look back on this episode as a start of something very positive for Llano. But we do need to take a look at it, and we're not going to move forward without your input.

So with that, let me go ahead and close this issue, unless Mr. Nichols or Ms. Wynne has something more to say.

We appreciate, again, the effort that you've taken to come here. We understand the vigilantes have entered Llano now and you'd better get back.

(Laughter.)

MR. LANEY: Thanks for coming. We're going to recess for five minutes.

(Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)

MR. LANEY: Senator Fraser, you're welcome.

SEN. FRASER: Am I up?

MR. LANEY: You're up. We've been waiting with an empty microphone for 30 minutes waiting for you to arrive. Glad to have you here.

SEN. FRASER: It's good to be here. I've covered a lot of miles already today. We've been to Abilene, San Antonio and here. It's good to be with the Commission today. I appreciate you allowing me to address you on this issue and say hello to the Commissioners. I think all of you know, I'm a member of the Senate Interim Committee on Transportation, and we've got to spend quite a few hours with the commissioners and Wes this year.

For the record, my name is Troy Fraser and I'm the state senator from District 24 which includes the city of Llano. I thank you again for the opportunity to be here.

As the Commission is well aware, TxDOT is currently examining options regarding the future of the Roy B. Inks Bridge on Highway 16 that goes through Llano. This project has generated considerable interest, not only from Llano but throughout my district.

First, I want you to have a clear understanding of the feedback I'm receiving from the community about their preferences on this project so that we ensure that those thoughts will be taken into account by you and the ultimate decision makers on this project.

In the last few weeks, we have received literally dozens of letters and phone calls that have started coming in through the area. Every one coming in, we gauge those calls and letters. It's running well over 80 percent of the people that are opposed to any plans for a bypass because of the expected negative impact that it would have on the downtown business community as well as the community at large.

You, I think, are receiving from the Llano City Council, the Llano County Chamber of Commerce, and the Llano Economic Development Corporation, they’re all on record unanimously opposing the bypass option. Each member of the Transportation Commission, as well as Wes Heald, I think you have also received communication from Lieutenant Governor Bob Bullock's office in opposition to this, and I'm here today to also go on record as strongly opposing this, because I do not think it would be in the best interest of the city of Llano or Llano County.

Second, I would like to leave here today with a little better understanding of how TxDOT intends to proceed with the decision-making process. I'm a firm believer that the local residents, regardless of their position on this project, should have the opportunity to express their opinions about it and the collective will of the community be taken into account.

We think it's absolutely critical that the community have an opportunity to voice its opinion on this matter. It is our understanding that the public meeting that had been canceled has been rescheduled for November 10. I applaud you for that. Based on what I'm hearing from the people in the businesses who would be most affected, I'm confident that the Commission and the Department will make the correct decision once the general public has had an opportunity to be heard.

And I would thank you for your time, and any questions of me?

MR. LANEY: Does anybody have any questions? Robert, any questions?

MR. NICHOLS: I have no questions. I think Chairman Laney is probably going to give you feedback on what we just discussed earlier.

SEN. FRASER: Thank you.

MR. LANEY: Anne, do you have any comments or questions first?

MS. WYNNE: No, sir.

MR. LANEY: In absence of knowing your position, we went ahead and voted while you were gone and decided to move Llano; leave the bridge where it is and move the city is the easiest way.

(Laughter.)

MR. LANEY: It's a little more expensive but it's an easy solution.

What we heard, Senator, in your absence -- and I'm sure you heard the same thing -- is a wide range of positions with respect to the various issues, and we weren't as clear on who had taken what formal position, what organization had taken what position, as you just laid out, so that helps a lot.

And what we have basically said is it is important that the initiative begins at the local level, and we are not about to unilaterally march in and impose a decision on a community like Llano, or any other community in the state, without some guidance. And we have encouraged, as best we can, at least the attempt by those in the community to shape as unified a position as they can with respect to this particular set of issues: bridge and bridge structure issues, downtown economic opportunity issues, school zone and safety issues, whether it's just traffic levels or hazardous materials with respect to safety.

There are a lot of variables at play here and a lot of different interests, but it is, as you know better than I, a unique community with a lot going for it, and all the reason in the world to pull together and help us understand how best to solve their problem. So that's basically where we've left it.

SEN. FRASER: I know you're considering that there's very strong feelings about the historic importance of the current bridge.

MR. LANEY: Absolutely.

SEN. FRASER: I know that has to play in our decision, and I've seen the proposals that we're looking at, and I know there's feelings both ways about what we do with the bridge itself. But I think the option of a bypass, as I'm hearing it, is not a popular one with the local people, and I think it would be real detrimental to that economy, and I would hope that that would be a direction that we wouldn't take, and then we'd start focusing our attention on what do we do to solve the problem of getting a safe bridge there and yet being sensitive to the historic aspect of the bridge that's there.

MR. LANEY: Got a lot of work to do on it. Appreciate your input.

SEN. FRASER: Thank you so much, and I look forward to working with you on this.

MR. LANEY: Thank you. And we are going to go into recess for about five minutes and allow you all to move on. Thanks again for coming, those who joined us from Llano.

(Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)

MR. LANEY: Well, this is a strange thing to say at 1:15 in the afternoon, but that concludes the delegation portion of the meeting, and we will now proceed with our regular business meeting. The first item on the agenda is the approval of the minutes of our regular Commission meeting held on August 26, 1998, and the special meeting held on September 1, 1998.

MR. NICHOLS: I move we accept.

MR. LANEY: We have a motion. Can I have a second?

MS. WYNNE: I wasn't present at the September 1.

MR. LANEY: I'll make a second with respect to the September 1 and August 26. We have a motion and a second. All in favor?

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Moving into our regular business meeting, and I would ask the presenters to be ready and be as brief as you can, and we'll try to move the business meeting along as fast as we can.

Agenda Item 3(a)(1) Contract Management, Thomas Bohuslav.

MR. BOHUSLAV: Good evening, Commissioners.

Item 3(a)(1) is proposed adoption of amendments to Section 9.2 of the Texas Administrative Code concerning the Department's contract claim procedure. Senate Bill 370 of the 75th Session codified Transportation Code Section 201.112 which authorizes the Commission by rule to establish procedures for the informal resolution of a claim arising out of a contract.

This Section 9.2 of the Texas Administrative Code is amended to comply with the requirements of Transportation Code Section 201.112. The changes to the Section 9.2 include:

It changes the references to the new sections and chapters in the Transportation Code;

It authorizes the chairman of the Claims Committee to add members, including one or more district engineers with a preference for district engineers that do not have a contractual relationship with the contractor involved;

It allows the contractor to submit the claim to the Construction Division for the Claims Committee, in addition to the Department office director under whose administration the contract was or is being performed;

It also allows the executive director to change a finding of fact or conclusion of law made by the administrative law judge or the executive director may vacate or modify an order issued by the administrative law judge; in doing so, the executive director must provide a written statement containing the reason and legal basis for any change;

And lastly, it adds some clarity that all oral communication, reports or other written documentation prepared by staff are not admissible for any purpose in the formal administrative hearing.

Any questions?

MR. NICHOLS: In the procedure where we jump around the district and they apply straight for a claim to the division, will the districts be contacted?

MR. BOHUSLAV: We will send them a copy of the report and the response to the contractor.

MR. NICHOLS: So that will be kind of an automatic thing.

MR. BOHUSLAV: Yes.

MR. NICHOLS: That's the only one I had.

MR. LANEY: Anne, any questions?

MS. WYNNE: No. I'll make the motion that we approve these. I've been amazed at how few contract claims come to our attention, given the volume of money that we deal with and the number of companies. I think that's really one of the shining stars of this Agency is that contractor claims are handled and everybody seems happy with the process.

MR. NICHOLS: I'll second.

MR. LANEY: We have a motion and a second. All in favor?

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. LANEY: Anne, let me just add to what you just said about the Department. I was in discussions with some construction lawyers over a particular issue from California, and we talked about Texas to some extent, and they basically said TxDOT has a reputation for settling all its contract claims. And you know, this is from lawyers who wanted there to be controversy and litigation, so it was the ultimate compliment.

MR. HEALD: Well, to give Mike a pat on the back too, he's trying to streamline this process and we've been running some months behind in some contractor claims, and he's trying to get them up to date where we don't have a list lingering.

I don't know whether I mentioned these are rules for proposed adoption, but I'm sure you understood that.

Additional rules for proposed adoption, Agenda Item 3(a)(2) Traffic Operations, Tom Newbern.

MR. NEWBERN: My name is Tom Newbern, director of the Traffic Operations Division to talk about Agenda Item 3(a)(2), proposed adoption of amendments to Section 25.1 concerning uniform traffic control devices.

House Bill 297 passed by the 75th Legislature added Transportation Code 544.001 which directed the Department or any local authority to use the words "Left Lane for Passing Only" on any new sign directing slower traffic, moving traffic from the furthest left lane of a multi-lane divided highway.

This proposed amendment will update the Texas Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices with revision 7 and will replace the existing language for "Slower Traffic Keep Right" signs with language for the new sign "Left Lane for Passing Only." We recommend approval of this minute order which proposes adoption of amendments to Section 25.1. Any questions?

MR. LANEY: Any questions?

MR. NICHOLS: No.

MR. LANEY: Can I have a motion?

MS. WYNNE: So moved.

MR. NICHOLS: Second.

MR. LANEY: All in favor?

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: I'm trying to get organized here. We're going to skip to Agenda Item 4, Approval of the 1999 Unified Transportation Program, and I believe Jerry Selby is going to handle that.

MR. SELBY: I'm Jerry Selby, deputy director of the Transportation Planning and Programming Division.

The Unified Transportation Program, known as the UTP, is the basic transportation planning document that guides and controls project development for TxDOT and is updated annually. A draft '99 UTP was previously prepared and submitted to the districts and the local MPOs this July.

A total of approximately 354 letters with comments were received from various local entities and residents around the state regarding projects relating to the '99 draft UTP. We received a large number of letters on two projects requesting their inclusion in the UTP. For other projects, we received approximately one to seven letters for each of these projects.

In general, most of the letters received were requests for projects to be funded or advanced to a higher level of authority. Some of the projects which were mentioned have already been included in the final '99 UTP. A few letters received could not be addressed, since the information contained did not pertain to this document.

The final '99 UTP minute order you have for consideration authorizes a total of $10.3 billion for all of the statewide selected projects in Exhibit A through T which includes a total of $6.6 billion in Priority 1, $3.7 billion in Priority 2.

Please note that Exhibit A contains the structure of the various categories of work, including: descriptions, restrictions, methods of allocation, and policy. Exhibit N contains a list of congressional high priority projects which were approved by the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century, known as TEA 21, on June 29, 1998.

Exhibit R contains information from the Aviation Capital Improvement Program, and Exhibit S contains information from the Public Transportation Division on transit programs to be requested for approval by future minute orders.

Specific projects have been recommended based upon project selection criteria for that category. The NHS projects were evaluated by the cost effectiveness index; the STP railroad grade separation by criteria related to safety at railroad crossings; bridges by the Texas Eligible Bridge Selection System; and the farm roads by cost per vehicle mile. The hurricane evacuation routes were recommended through consensus of the affected districts.

Finally, approval of the 1999 UTP is needed in order to continue project planning for the fiscal year 1999 and beyond. We recommend approval of the proposed minute order.

MR. LANEY: Any questions, Anne?

MS. WYNNE: I don't have any questions, I just have one comment.

MR. LANEY: Please.

MS. WYNNE: I just want to say thank you to the staff for the hard work that you all put into this document. Every year it seems like our process gets better and better, and I feel more confident that the evaluation system that we have in place is working, and that really the best projects are rising to the top.

I'm very happy to see the money that the City of Austin got in the UTP and thank both of you all for supporting those $60 million worth of projects. It's been a little lonely up here to support road projects in this city; it hasn't been exactly politically correct, so I've been kind of lonely these past few years, and I'm really glad to see the community start to get behind some much needed road projects in this area.

And this will be the last UTP that I'll vote on, so I just wanted to make sure that I said thank you to the staff for all the great work you've done in the last five years that I've gotten to vote on this way of selecting road projects.

MR. NICHOLS: I was going to compliment you also. I have been very impressed with the process. I understand it a lot better and I know what you go through, and I want to compliment everybody that had a part of it. That said, I'll move that we adopt it.

MR. LANEY: We have a motion. Can I have a second?

MS. WYNNE: Second.

MR. LANEY: Let me make a couple of comments too, first of all. Anne picked up on something that is probably one of the most important characteristics of this year's UTP and that is Austin's step forward along the lines of the other major metropolitan areas of the state, and really with most of the rest of the state, finally. And it's important because of some of the pressure on some of the projects in Austin that we would not even be considering were it not for Anne's continued effort in trying to convey the message to Austin -- and I think it's finally been received due to her efforts -- that we were not going to be going forward on these kinds of projects without Austin's participation. This is the start and Austin, I think, now understands very well how we move these things forward, and we look forward to working with Austin years to come.

But again, I have to say the pump was primed by Anne's efforts -- lonely efforts, as she puts it -- over a number of years, and she has done a remarkable job in a difficult situation. So my compliments to you, Anne.

And our thanks to the City of Austin, and that is the way we're going on all these kinds of projects.

Jerry, my hat's off to you too. Terrific job, not an easy job, because as you know, we all have slightly different angles on how to proceed and you somehow or other seem to accommodate them all. Pulling rabbits out of the hat but never pulling enough dollars out of the hat, as far as we're concerned. But terrific job for you and your staff, a really great job.

MR. SELBY: Thank you.

MR. LANEY: We have a motion and a second. All in favor?

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. LANEY: I am going to depart and I will turn the gavel over to Anne for the remainder of the meeting. Thanks, Anne, for picking up.

MR. HEALD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, it's Jerry Selby's youth and inexperience that prevails.

(Laughter.)

MS. WYNNE: Let me say one thing on this subject before we go to the next. Thank you for those kind words. I don't want to leave the impression that I was, like, doing this by myself, because there have been people that have put untold hours in this community on work on transportation issues.

Our state senator has worked very hard, as chairman of our MPO, to get the community to where we are; our new mayor has worked very hard. So I don't want anybody thinking that I had anything to do with this other than one little voice up here. We have a lot of people that understood transportation issues, and it took their hard work to get everybody else on board.

So having said that, we move on.

MR. HEALD: Moving along, more additional rules for proposed adoption, Agenda Item 3(a)(3), Lawrance Smith.

MR. L. SMITH: Commissioners, good to see you again. My name is Lawrance Smith; I'm director of the Motor Carrier Division within TxDOT. I may have the longest listed item but it will probably be the shortest presentation.

MS. WYNNE: We like that. Good.

MR. L. SMITH: You have before you a minute order proposing the repeal of various sections of Chapter 28 and the subsequent adoption of new sections to replace the repealed sections, as well as amendments to various sections, all of which address oversize, overweight permits.

These proposed changes are focused on streamlining existing rules by combining similar subjects and clarifying new and existing policies and procedures. The current rules are cumbersome and at times difficult to understand. The proposed sections are part of the Department's overall strategy to modernize and streamline existing rules, while clarifying new and existing policies and procedures. Additionally, the changes eliminate unnecessary red tape and provide for service improvements for the Department and our customers.

On June 5 of this year, the Department published in the Texas Register what I'll classify as an advance notice of proposed rulemaking, addressing the subjects that were being anticipated for review. We received two comments and those comments were utilized prior to the development of this proposed rule package. At this time, staff is submitting the minute order for your consideration and recommends its approval.

MS. WYNNE: Questions?

MR. NICHOLS: I know this affects an awful lot of people -- it's a very large set of rules -- mainly the motor carriers because of the weights and things of that nature, so I'll be really looking forward to see what type of comments they have. So as soon as we get those comments in, I would appreciate kind of an early signal back because I think there may be a lot. But I really don't have any questions I've gone through it, so I'll move that we adopt it.

MS. WYNNE: Second that. All those in favor, say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Moving on to rules for Final Adoption, Agenda Item 3(b)(1), Employment Practices having to do with employee training and education, and Bob Eason, interim director of the Human Resource Division will handle it.

MR. EASON: Good afternoon.

This change to the rules for education and training was brought about primarily because of reorganization in March of this year. Most of the changes are cosmetic, in that we've changed the terminology for management team and senior management team. We also realigned some of the approval points on the titles that had that structure at that time to the district engineers, division directors, and office directors. And we also allowed the director of the Human Resources Division the authority to extend participation in the master's program if somebody needed an additional six months or a semester to finish the full-time master's program.

We closed comments on this on the 10th of August; we did not get any comments. We recommend adoption of the final form at this meeting.

MS. WYNNE: Questions?

MR. NICHOLS: No questions. I move we adopt.

MS. WYNNE: I second. All those in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item 3(b)(2), Finance, having to do with hardship financing for utility adjustments, relocations, and removals, and Frank Smith will handle it.

MR. F. SMITH: Commissioners, I'm Frank Smith, director of Finance.

This item pertains to final adoption of the rules concerning hardship financing for utility adjustments, relocation, and removals. The rules were published for public comment, and having received no comments, the staff recommends approval.

MS. WYNNE: Questions?

MR. NICHOLS: So moved that we adopt.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item 3(b)(3), State Infrastructure Bank Loan, Frank will handle that also.

MR. F. SMITH: This item is requesting final approval of amendments to the State Infrastructure Bank Rules. The proposed amendments will speed up the loan application process by reducing the two-step Commission approval to a one-step Commission approval for all of the loans that are $200,000 or less. And the staff recommends approval.

MR. NICHOLS: I thought it was a good change. I move we adopt it.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item 3(b)(4), Chapter 15, Transportation Planning and Programming having to do with amendment to the rules for State Park Roads, and Bob Kovar will handle it.

MR. KOVAR: I'm Bob Kovar, deputy director of the Design Division.

This minute order is for final adoption of amendments to Section 15.6 of the rules concerning State Park Roads. The proposed amendments are necessary to comply with legislation that gave the Department the responsibility for roads in and adjacent to fish hatcheries and wildlife management areas, in addition to those inside state parks.

The Commission passed a minute order at the June Commission meeting for the proposed amendments and authorized publication. The proposed amendments were advertised, no comments were received. Staff recommends approval.

MR. NICHOLS: I do have a question on this. Does this affect any memorandum of agreement that we currently have on non-state roads for maintenance related to parks? Specifically, I know that in Big Bend State Park on the west side, there's a county road, a dirt county road -- I didn't know that till I went out there -- that goes down to --

MS. WYNNE: You've been everywhere.

MR. NICHOLS: Yes. Well, it's a dirt road. Why was I on a dirt road?

MS. WYNNE: You have now been on our dirt roads, not to mention all our paved roads.

(Laughter.)

MR. NICHOLS: We have a ten-mile stretch of dirt county road that our state is maintaining out of the Presidio office with a memorandum of agreement between the state and Parks & Wildlife and the county; so we maintain ten miles of this dirt county road. Would this affect that? That's the only access to the west side of that park.

MR. KOVAR: Yes, sir, I think it does. We only have authority to expend our funds on those roads either on our system or that are under the jurisdiction of Texas Parks & Wildlife.

MR. NICHOLS: But we have an agreement to maintain --

MS. WYNNE: Bob, if we have an existing memorandum?

MR. NICHOLS: I know we have that agreement.

MR. JACKSON: We have an agreement with Parks & Wildlife to implement this statute to do park roads, and that agreement may need to be changed only to change some definitions, and Parks & Wildlife has agreed with these rule changes.

I'm not familiar with that situation. If that road is under the jurisdiction and owned by the county, then we would have a problem with this rule change. One point of changing the rule was to clarify that the intent of the legislation was to only apply to roads owned, controlled and under the jurisdiction of the Department of Parks & Wildlife, not a county road.

MR. NICHOLS: We may have a problem here then, because that's the only access to the west side of Big Bend State Park, and it is a county road and we're maintaining it.

MS. WYNNE: So do you want the staff to look at that memorandum and see if we can come up with a way to keep maintaining that road and still pass this?

MR. NICHOLS: Well, yes. What I'm kind of wondering is if I became aware of that one situation, how many situations am I not aware of that may fall into that same category, and do we need to delay this until we get that answer? I'd hate to approve it --

MR. BEHRENS: Bob, if that was handled by a separate agreement, that particular road that the Commissioner is talking about, would that be a problem?

MR. JACKSON: We would need to see if we have the legal authority to be maintaining that road.

MS. WYNNE: We can put this off.

MR. NICHOLS: Well, I mean, if we approve this, that could create a problem for a few of those, the one in particular that I'm aware of and any others that I'm not aware of. Isn't that what you're saying?

MR. JACKSON: Yes.

MR. NICHOLS: Maybe we ought to defer it until they check into it.

MS. WYNNE: Sure, we can defer it. And one of the things that we might do is try to make this prospective only so that if there are any.

MR. NICHOLS: Moving forward. Yes, that was my second question, that if any that are already in there are grandfathered, then that takes care of it.

MR. JACKSON: We could do that. We could come back next month and make that change.

MS. WYNNE: I'm pretty sure that if he's uncovered this road -- you're the only person in this Department that knows about it -- let's go see if there are any others and come back next month, and if we need to have it rewritten so that it's prospective.

MR. NICHOLS: The area engineer in Alpine and State Representative Gallegos told me about it and I went out there and looked at it. I suggest we defer it then.

MS. WYNNE: It will be deferred. Thank you for bringing that to our attention.

MR. HEALD: And there may be others that we don't know about.

Under Item 3(c), Rule Review, Bob.

MR. JACKSON: Bob Jackson, acting general counsel.

The Appropriations Bill requires that we consider the re-adoption of every rule every four years. This month is the turn of Public Transportation, and this minute order authorizes us to publish a notice to begin the process. We recommend approval of the minute order.

MS. WYNNE: Questions?

MR. NICHOLS: I so move.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item 5, Transportation Planning - Feasibility study to evaluate Bolivar Peninsula Ferry Operations, Jerry Selby.

MR. SELBY: This minute order provides for the feasibility study status to evaluate the effect of various improvement options at the Galveston Island to Bolivar Peninsula ferry crossing. The ferry has been in operation since 1930; the ferry has reached an unacceptable level of operation.

Options to be considered include: modeling for hurricane evacuation; for congestion relief; travel time delay; emergency services response; and air quality. Improvements to this crossing are included in the 2008 and 2020 long range projects listed in the Houston-Galveston Transportation Management Area's Vision 2020 Metropolitan Transportation Plan. We recommend approval of the minute order.

MR. NICHOLS: I so move.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item Number 6, Public Transportation; Agenda Items 6(a) and (b), and Margot Massey will handle both of those.

MS. MASSEY: Item 6(a), on our Elderly and Disabled Transit Program, both the Fort Worth and Amarillo districts had projects fall out and we're proposing to replace them. The districts have submitted replacement programs or projects for your approval. We recommend this minute order.

MR. NICHOLS: There's an (a) and (b); we're on (a)?

MS. MASSEY: Yes, sir.

MS. WYNNE: Is there a motion on (a) or questions on (a)?

MR. NICHOLS: I so move that we accept (a).

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MS. MASSEY: On (b), this is Capital earmark. Last month we brought you a similar minute order. We are now going back and capturing the unobligated balances from the FY '97 earmark, which is about $146,000, and about $7,000 from the FY '98 earmark, using the same performance-based formula that we discussed with you last month. This will award funds to buy equipment for three rural transit agencies. We recommend approval.

MR. NICHOLS: We're not changing anything related to the minute order of August 26, '98? It refers to that minute order.

MS. MASSEY: No, sir.

MR. NICHOLS: So it's just a reference as opposed to a change in that.

MS. MASSEY: Yes, sir.

MR. NICHOLS: I didn't have any questions.

MS. WYNNE: Motion?

MR. NICHOLS: I so move.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item Number 7, SIB loan final approval, Frank Smith.

MR. F. SMITH: I'm just about to get to be a pro at this on this particular loan application.

MS. WYNNE: You are.

(Laughter.)

MR. F. SMITH: A couple more times up, and I'll have it down pat.

I'm Frank Smith, director of Finance, and hopefully this is the last reading of this loan application. Item 7 is requesting your final approval for a $13,412 loan from the State Infrastructure Bank to Motley County for replacement of a much needed bridge.

MR. NICHOLS: I so move.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Do you really mean that final, Frank?

(Laughter.)

MR. HEALD: Item Number 8, Contracts, and Thomas Bohuslav will handle them.

MR. BOHUSLAV: Item 8(a)(1) is for the consideration of the award or rejection of building construction contracts let on September 10, 1998 as shown in Exhibit A. These projects are: the travel information center, including site improvements in Anthony, El Paso County; the engineering and maintenance facility, including site improvements in Beaumont, Jefferson County; and the re-roofing of seven buildings at the headquarters facility in Yoakum in DeWitt County.

We have three projects let, total of 15 bids, for an average of five bids per project. The total low bid was $5,221,000, for an amount underrun of 19 percent. Staff recommends award of all building projects listed in Exhibit A.

MS. WYNNE: Motion?

MR. NICHOLS: So moved.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. BOHUSLAV: Item 8(a)(2) is for the consideration of award or rejection of highway maintenance contracts let on September 3 and 4, 1998, whose engineers' estimated costs are $300,000 or more, as shown on Exhibit A.

We had a total of six projects let, 19 bids received, for an average of 3.17 bids per project. The total low bid amount was $2,783,981.07, for an amount overrun of 3.88 percent.

We have one project we'd recommend for rejection. In Fannin County, on the first page. We received one bid, the low bid being from Buster Paving Company, Inc., in the amount of $605,935, or a 64.56 percent overrun. The Paris District said that the bid was unrealistically high and that their estimate they felt was fair and reasonable, and they would like to relet the project and hope for better competition in the future.

Any questions?

MR. NICHOLS: I move we accept them.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. BOHUSLAV: Item 8(a)(3) is the consideration of award or rejection of highway construction contracts let on September 3 and 4, 1998, as shown on Exhibit A.

We had a total of 65 projects, received 212 bids, for an average of 3.26 bids per project. The total low bid amount was $93,427,261.87, for an amount overrun of 1.73 percent.

We have four projects we recommend for rejection, beginning in Chambers County, on the bottom of page 2, Project Number 3033. We received one bid, being from Infrastructure Services, Inc., in the amount of $258,934.07, or a 65.36 overrun. This project is to add a left turn lane for the Bayer Corporation there and is 100 percent funded by the company. The Bayer Company has requested that we re-evaluate the project and propose for a letting at a future date.

In addition, another project recommended for rejection is in Coleman County, on the top of page 3, Project Number 3053. We received three bids, the low bid being from Contract Paving Company in the amount of $184,651.28, or a 61.45 percent overrun. This work is to perform some landscape development and remove a few islands, and the district would like to review the scope of the work and would like to combine it with another project for a future letting to try to reduce the unit prices we received on this project.

Another project recommended for rejection is in Howard County, the second listing on page 9, Project Number 3070. We received two bids, the low bid being from Knight Construction, Inc., in the amount of $592,592.53, or an amount overrun of 38.71 percent. And obviously, the contractor's price was high, and due to additional deterioration of the concrete slab on the project, the district would like to re-evaluate for total replacement of the slab instead of just doing slab repair on it. The district would like to relet at a future date.

Again, a project recommended for rejection is a project in Sabine County, the third listing on page 11, Project Number 3054. We received one bid being from McKinney and Moore, Inc., in the amount of $112,442, for an amount overrun of 80.73 percent. This work is in the city of Pineland, and a portion of the funds is a Keep Texas Beautiful Award the city received in the amount of $25,000. The district would like to make some changes to the plans and relet and hope to get more competition on this project.

Do you have any questions?

MR. NICHOLS: No. You had answered all my questions really previously.

MS. WYNNE: Did you include for rejection the one in Fannin County and I just missed it?

MR. BOHUSLAV: Is that the first one I mentioned? Is that in the maintenance contract?

MS. WYNNE: It's the last one on the list that you gave us.

MR. BOHUSLAV: That Fannin County project.

MS. WYNNE: The first one you did, one bidder. Okay.

MR. BOHUSLAV: That's in the maintenance contracts, I believe -- yes. It's State Highway 56; that's the maintenance contract that I did address.

MS. WYNNE: Great.

MR. NICHOLS: So moved.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Thank you, Thomas.

Agenda Item 8(b)(1) and (2), Contract Claims, and Mike Behrens will handle it.

MR. BEHRENS: We had two claims that we need approval of the claim settlement. The first is in Borden County with Birchwood Construction Company. They filed a claim in the amount of $79,778 for additional compensation for work performed during the construction of the project. The Claims Committee met and offered Birchwood Construction a settlement of $8,280. We have not heard from Birchwood Construction in the prescribed time period; so the Committee's recommendation will be considered final and all further appeal will be barred.

The next is a claim in Travis County with Hunter Industries. The claim was filed in the amount of $49,689.78 for recovery of bonus compensation paid during the project and then deducted on the final estimate. The Committee met and offered Hunter Industries a settlement of $25,000; they accepted that settlement on August 28, 1998.

Both of those claims will be paid after we've received their duly authorized and completed settlement agreement and release. We recommend approval of both of these settlements.

MS. WYNNE: Any questions?

MR. NICHOLS: No questions. I move.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item Number 9, Contested Cases, and Bob Jackson will handle it.

MR. JACKSON: Bob Jackson, acting general counsel.

The Department issued a permit for an outdoor advertising sign and discovered that all the information on the application for the permit was not correct and canceled the permit. The cancellation was appealed and the cancellation was upheld by the administration law judge; so the minute order provides for the adoption of the proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law and for the issuance of a final order. We recommend approval of the minute order.

MR. NICHOLS: I really kind of had a little bit of a question. If the guy had no -- or the company had no permission from the owners of the property to put up the sign, which is my understanding, under what basis did they appeal?

MR. JACKSON: I don't know why they appealed the decision.

MR. NICHOLS: The people that owned the land never agreed to let them.

MS. WYNNE: Kind of a no-brainer.

MR. NICHOLS: I don't know how he appealed it. Anyway, that's the only question I had.

MS. WYNNE: Motion?

MR. NICHOLS: So moved.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item Number 10, we have several minute orders for your consideration.

The first one has to do with Speed Zones, Various Counties - Establish or alter regulatory and construction speed zones on various sections of highways in the state.

And we could take these all together, if you prefer, and stop me if you want to discuss one of them.

MR. NICHOLS: That's fine.

MR. HEALD: The next is Agenda Item 10(b), Load Restrictions, Various Counties - Revisions of load restrictions on various roads and bridges on the state highway system.

10(c), Right of Way Disposition, Purchase and Lease. In Ector County, consider the sale of a surplus warehouse site; (c)(2) consider the acceptance of a donated right of way in exchange for surplus right of way on FM 2570 in Freestone County; and (c)(3) consider the sale of a surplus drainage easement on FM 2063 in McLennan County.

Item 10(d), Traffic Control, Chambers County - Authorize the establishment of a temporary one-way traffic control to and from the Houston Raceway Park facility during the 1998 National Hot Rod Association Matco Tools SuperNationals.

10(3)(e), Approval of Donation to the Department - Authorization to accept donation from MBNA America Bank, N.A., to Texas Department of Transportation for the Don't Mess with Texas litter prevention campaign.

MR. NICHOLS: I have a question there. Now, they're using that logo on their credit cards, as I understand it. They're not paying this as a way to do that, they're just making a donation, but it referred to that. So is the bank -- do we let anyone who wants to use that logo use it, or do we have to have a contract, or do we charge for that?

MR. HEALD: Doris, I'm glad you're here.

MS. HOWDESHELL: Good afternoon. I'm Doris Howdeshell, the director of the Travel Division.

MBNA does not have exclusive right to use that logo, they just have permission to print it on the credit card. Any other bank that came to us and asked us for permission to do the same, we would have to offer them that opportunity. And they do give us a donation annually; this is the sixth donation; the first donation was for $689, because it was a very limited number of months, and every year since then has been $25,000.

MR. NICHOLS: So for anyone to use that logo, they have to make an arrangement with us, but they do not have to pay for that.

MS. HOWDESHELL: They do not pay for it, and technically, if I understand correctly -- if Bob is still here -- they don't actually have to have our written permission; it is not copyrighted, it is not trademarked, but usually people do come to us and ask and we will ask them to use it in a way that's not detrimental to the Department.

MR. NICHOLS: So that's not copyrighted?

MR. JACKSON: Yes, sir, that's correct.

MR. NICHOLS: So I could use it.

MS. HOWDESHELL: That's technically correct.

MR. NICHOLS: Well, then I want to make sure before we pass on that point our thanks to the America Bank for the contribution; it's a wonderful thing.

MS. HOWDESHELL: Commissioner, what they do in their direct mail marketing is they will put a statement in there that part of the proceeds for the use of that card goes to the Department's litter prevention campaign.

MR. NICHOLS: I think that's great. Thanks.

MR. HEALD: Moving on to the last routine minute order for your consideration, under Eminent Domain Proceedings - Request for eminent domain proceedings on non-controlled and controlled access highways. And that concludes all the routine minute orders.

MS. WYNNE: Is there a motion?

MR. NICHOLS: I move we adopt them.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

MR. HEALD: Agenda Item 11 has been deferred.

We will not need an executive session, and as you well remember, the Open Comment Period is over with -- I hope. Are there others?

MS. WYNNE: Is there anybody else who would like to speak during the Open Comment Period? If not, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn.

MR. NICHOLS: So moved we adjourn.

MS. WYNNE: Second. All in favor, please say aye.

(A chorus of ayes.)

(Whereupon, at 2:00 p.m., the meeting was adjourned.)

C E R T I F I C A T E

MEETING OF: Texas Transportation Commission

LOCATION: Austin, Texas

DATE: September 24, 1998

I do hereby certify that the foregoing pages, numbers 1 through 158, inclusive, are the true, accurate, and complete transcript prepared from the verbal recording made by electronic recording by Penny Bynum before the Texas Department of Transportation.

09/29/98

(Transcriber) (Date)

On the Record Reporting, Inc.

3307 Northland, Suite 315

Austin, Texas 78731