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MEETING MINUTES PALMDALE HSR SAP I 1 MEETING MINUTES TECHNICAL WORKING GROUP (TWG) MEETING #6 Phone and WebEx I 05-10-18 – 10:00 – 11:30 AM 1 Welcome: Mike Behen provided introductory remarks, thanked participants for their time and welcomed everyone to the meeting. Agenda Roland Genick provided a brief overview of the structure of the meeting, which would cover 3 major areas: 1. Project updates and rationale for the extended schedule 2. Technical discussion on the current HSR alignment, the Multi-Modal Access Study, and the Palmdale Transit Area Specific Plan 3. Open Discussion All attendees were encouraged to treat the meeting as a workshop and to participate actively. 2 Project Update – TOD3 Environmental Clearance Original vision for the project was to use the TOD3 Environmental Document, Avenue Q study and HSR Station Area Plan all as informing documents to potential updates to the City’s existing regulatory framework. As the project got underway, the economic studies and other case studies of similar projects show that placemaking and character/urban design surrounding the station will need to be a major component. Consultant team has worked with the City to find the right tool to enable that component and decided on the creation of an updated Specific Plan, with a strong form-based code element, will best enable the city to manage permits and achieve development of the kind that is desired. A. Mack: Was the plan originally to amend the general plan vs. a creating whole new specific plan? R. Genick: Yes. City council would adopt the findings of each of the overlay projects and then use that to inform documents/amendments as they were being renewed. The route to obtain environmental clearance for the new specific plan is to complete TOD3 Study and then build upon that with a Negative Declaration that would clear the HSR SAP project environmentally. It will still be a full environmental clearance to be adopted by City Council with all the legal means and tools that are needed. The impacts created by the new Specific Plan will fit underneath the environmental clearance prepared for the “Palmdale TOD Framework Plan” (TOD3), which was completed in January 2018. Project Update – Schedule The highlights of the resulting revised schedule include a July public meeting with the project going to the planning commission in July/August and if approved, on to City Council in August/September. A. Mack: Is the Transit Area Specific Plan the new document that encompasses the Station Area Plan, Ave Q study and TOD3 in one? R. Genick: Those included circulation recommendations, design recommendation, and land use recommendations and will be used to inform the Specific Plan document, but the specific plan will be the only item formally adopted. M. Behen: The Transit Village Specific Plan currently in place, which is a much smaller area, will be replaced by the Transit Area Specific Plan. ATTENDEES Mike Behen Rob Bruce Chuck Heffernan Jorge Loor (CHA) City of Palmdale Roland Genick Simran Malhotra Celeste Milam Judy Taylor * Parsons Team Ben Lichty Michelle Boehm * Juan Carlos Velasquez Ken Zatarain * CHSRA Anna Lee Buehn AVBOT Ron Mathieu * SCRRA Andrew Mack Xpress West Brian Balderrama * Metro Steve Fox * SCAG Richard Marshalian Susie Tae LA County Planning * participation by phone ---PAGE BREAK--- MEETING MINUTES PALMDALE HSR - AREA PLAN I 2 Project Update – TOD Examples The project team has looked nationally at TOD examples including some along the Northeast Rail Corridor and Denver Union Station. Denver has transformed their station and put in a commuter rail line from the airport to the downtown area. The project team has taken the time to distill down the examples that were reviewed and extract a few major common guiding principles which will inform the core chapters of the Specific Plan, and they are as follows: - Collaboration- No one can do this by themselves. It’s a collaboration between the city, transit agencies and developers. - Creating a Place-There is greater value created when you create a holistic, urban design approach. Build a place and not just a project. - Good Planning: The city has looked at this area from various angles and the decision to convert to a Specific Plan was determined to be the way to do it right, instead of taking shortcuts. - Mix of Uses-No TOD examples are just housing or just commercial or just retail. A mix of uses gives longer time-of-day life in each project. It creates activity, people coming together and a more vibrant place. The team further looked also at some specific examples in Dallas, TX and took an evaluation of what the principles in that City were and what they did right. One key component in the heart of Dallas was Klyde Warren Park, which was created as an overlay over an existing depressed freeway. A great example to turn a normally disruptive element in the heart of the city into an asset. A non-profit agency operates the park. One of the key takeaways from this example was that monetizing the assets the City already has, or will produce, can create value for the City. Numerous studies have shown this park to be a huge success story. This example speaks to several of the principles that were being considered for our SAP project. B. Lichty: Regarding monetizing, is there a priority or goal to charge for parking in the station area? R. Bruce: Probably, eventually. We need to get activity going first and then seek authorization to charge for parking once it becomes an active center. R. Genick: A key component of what we are creating here is the value capture strategy. It’s not focused on capturing value through parking revenue per se, but much rather on identifying tools that might be able to capture the value created from new development with the intent to invest it into the infrastructure supporting it. J. Taylor: Pasadena leveraged parking revenue. This is something we can think about for the station area later down the line when use will make more sense to charge for parking. M. Behen: A good summary of the site visits can be found in the following take-aways: • Environmental and regulatory processes in the places we visited (Reston, Providence, Denver) was much easier and more flexible. This is a hurdle to work through in California. • Integration of rail with other travel modes was done very well in these places. People experience ease of use and they are used to using rail to get around regularly. The Acela line was exciting and very different from what we have here. • Development around stations was incredible, especially in Denver. Live, Work, Play theory was evident. Lots of mixed use development and real estate values in these places are some of the highest in the area. A. Buehn: Are these rail systems in other places privately or publicly funded? M. Behen: It’s a variety. Dallas has a lot of private funding. R. Genick: The Eagle Project in Denver has private money. It is the biggest P3 transit project to be completed in the US. Not fully privately funded, but has long-term revenue source, such as bonds or taxes. They found a private entity to provide up-front financing for the construction of the project and is now operating it in exchange for an availability payment from RTD, which is the local transit agency. There are creative ways on the financing structure of some of the rail lines that we looked at that create a more progressive dynamic in terms of development surrounding the stations. A. Buehn: When you were studying this project did you evaluate private vs. public funding and the speed of build and development? Does it vary depending on cost sources? R. Genick: One of the reason Denver and many are looking at P3’s, is that it’s great for acceleration of projects. Metro is considering P3’s because programs like Measure M are funded over a long period of time. P3’s are more developed on the roadways side than the transit side, but P3’s are a good way to ---PAGE BREAK--- MEETING MINUTES PALMDALE HSR - AREA PLAN I 3 accelerate projects and get them done earlier. Staying nimble and working together is critically important. Mega projects are complicated, and they will change. We need to have the ability to react and move with things that are changing and putting planning framework in place that enables us to recalibrate projects is critically important. M. Behen: The master developer concept in place at a lot of the case studies. Developers had a structure already set up, the majority had form-based zoning structures with public entities/local government taking on some risk. Master developers like flexibility. Project Update – Strategy for Regulatory Update The existing Palmdale Transit Village Specific Plan contains a lot of good information that is still current and in line with what the City is trying to achieve. Yet, the City did not get the quality of development they were looking for with original We will be leaving the information that still works in place and focus our efforts on those areas where the current plan falls short: • The current boundary is too narrowly focused and does not include the future HSR station • The plan lacks support for strong place making We will be creating two new chapters for the urban design framework and development and design regulations and be revising the boundary to include the station area at the center. Within the revised boundary we are still looking at a very large area that does not initially support uniform development at the densities we desire to support placemaking. The City would like to see initial development focused along Avenue Q and surrounding the HSR Station. The team is working with the City to put tools into place that will allow the City to steer development into areas they are most beneficial for the character we are trying to achieve. B. Lichty: With new specific plan, will there be any changes with height restrictions? As developers come in with proposals, will there be minimum density requirements? R. Bruce: Yes. We are also looking at minimum lot sizes and other requirements. Form based code will be enforced. 3 Technical Discussion – Current HSR Alignment There are several vertical HSR alignments that have been considered for the center of Palmdale. The only certainty is that it will be grade separated from the roadway network. The process of defining how it will eventually be configured is still ongoing. City has a preferred solution which is a depressed alignment and best supports the City’s overall vision for its new downtown. This alignment will be used to inform the Circulation Element and the Specific Plan. M. Boehm: One of the key things is that when we started the HSR Project it had a different schedule than it has today. The 2018 business plan is projecting southern segments being completed in 2033 instead of 2029. It’s very important that we look at the projected timing for the environmental document so that the two projects don’t constrain each other. Need to make sure that those documents that get done first include flexibility so there isn’t a conflict with what will be developed in later documents. We don’t want documents that create a barrier to what is coming later. R. Mathieu: I would like to add that the future alignment graphic should have a second track for regional rail. The final goal is to increase service and have a full double track system. A footprint of this station should include a second track for Metrolink. A. Mack: Xpress West is looking at an alignment that is on the north side of HDC. It would stay on the north the entire way to Victorville station so we don’t have to cross over the freeway. The Palmdale Y alternative design treatment has flexibility built in and Xpress West supports that as long as modifications stay within the thresholds identified in the environmental document. M. Boehm: Freeway and rail connection to HDC are really important to factor into the plan of the infrastructure at the station location. We don’t want to be showing that area configured in such a way that it conflicts with the connections to HDC. This should be a step that we take in the future. M. Boehm: Requests to have an offline discussion to make sure plans are consistent. A. Mack: Does HSR have a published forecast date for the environmental on this segment? M. Boehm: The agency’s goal is to update all of those dates in June. Advertisement to take on NEPA assignment is now out on the Federal Register. Likely looking at 18-24 months for completion. ---PAGE BREAK--- MEETING MINUTES PALMDALE HSR - AREA PLAN I 4 Technical Discussion – Update to Palmdale Transit Area Specific Plan (PTASP) The framework of the Specific Plan is based on a grid of major north/south connections as well as east/west connections. We are emphasizing Ave Q and Palmdale on the west side, looking for permeability across the HSR alignment to build a new downtown. Based on that framework we have developed a series of neighborhoods with varying characters surrounding the station area. The Specific Plan envisions a restoration of the street grid, especially between SR-14 and the rail track to just north of Avenue Q bringing back the connection from Division all the way to 4th Street and creating a new set of east/west connections. Avenue Q then becomes more of a mixed-use complete street. One of the major goals is to prevent lower density development from happening immediately adjacent to the HSR station so that when HSR comes online, land at the station is still available for the higher densities it then supports. The plan will include minimum lot sizes to allow for larger scale development. The plan includes some areas shown in grey that represents county owned land. The Specific Plan will include pre-zoning for those areas. A. Mack: Since County land is included within City Sphere, can’t it be included in Specific Plan? We have done similar inclusions in Victorville. S. Maholtra: Land uses can be assigned and proposed to the County even though it is County owned. S. Tae: We have identified in in our implementation program that major infrastructure projects, such as HDC and SR-138, are an opportunity to revisit and do more fine scale planning. The County would consider revisiting which zoning to adopt for those areas. B. Lichty: What is the timing of implementing Avenue Q to go through across the rail corridor? Is there timing to have this completed by 2033? M. Behen: We don’t have an implementation timeline for the Avenue Q Corridor at this time. That will be one of the priorities going forward as part of the General Plan update. S. Maholtra: Shared Avenue Q renderings of what this downtown core would look like. End plan is to update Specific Plan and a framework in place that can support the city’s goals. B. Lichty: Does the phasing concept address how the station area would transition from a car oriented area to a more pedestrian/human focused environment, specifically for Palmdale Blvd and Sierra Highway? M. Behen: We are still working on that. Part of the issue is that Palmdale Blvd. is within the Caltrans ROW. Our desire is to do that. R. Genick: We are showing in our update that Palmdale Blvd. should not be widened. We do not have strong language in our circulation study yet on how that can transition but will evaluate it further. R. Bruce: We are at the beginning of our General Plan update. City has large right of ways that can accommodate pedestrians; This is an issue also on Avenue Q. B. Lichty: I think this could be an action item for a section that describes existing conditions and discusses the General Plan and other strategies the city might implement over time to update and address transition from auto to a more pedestrian oriented area. 4 Information Required – HSR/Xpress West Station Footprint We have received an updated station plan from HSR. We understand that this is not final but will require the best possible information to support our land-use planning. To support the Specific Plan ROW and circulation need to be defined as closely as possible. A. Mack: In earlier planning studies, there was some debate as to what the parking requirement would be for the Palmdale station. XpressWest had agreed to defer specific parking analysis until Steer Davies report was done. The study is now published. Suggests the resulting parking requirements needs to be incorporated in a more specific, focused way. B. Lichty: Our approach to parking is to clear the maximum parking amount from the start. Parking maximums vary between HSR and Xpress West. Perhaps we all clear our own parking and then coordinate what actually goes in the ground. B. Lichty: I wanted to ask a question regarding the trench concept and current plans for underpasses. How do those come together as a concept? They seem to be conflicting. You can’t have an underpass with a trench. ---PAGE BREAK--- MEETING MINUTES PALMDALE HSR - AREA PLAN I 5 R. Bruce: We are still looking at both. One of the issues is that the rail corridor ROW keeps getting larger. When the ROW was narrower, some options made more sense. Now that it’s wider, we are looking at other options. M. Behen: We are trying to do land-use planning and the ROW has become problematic. There are major constraints and a further division of the city from east to west in this area. We will be putting some of these concerns into a letter to HSR soon. 5 Next Steps – Key Dates - Community Workshop planned for July - Planning Commission Meeting in late Summer - Specific Plan discussion with City Council in late Summer - Project wraps up after City Council adoption of Specific Plan Next Steps – Action Items - Schedule technical workshop to discuss alignment and circulation - Include discussion on parking in Specific Plan - Evaluate recent preferred Xpress West alignment - Identify path to implement desired zoning for County owned parcels - Strengthen language on active transportation and alternative mobility in Specific Plan - Provide summary of changed strategy to HSR and include reference to City preferred alignment