Transportation Commission - August 21, 2025

I'd like to formally call the meeting to
order. Welcome to city staff,
transportation commissioners, and the
public to the August 21st transportation
commission meeting. Meetings are being
held in person, televised on coxcable
channel 11, and streamed online on
Scottsdale.gov for the public to listen
and view the meeting in progress. I'd
like to ask for a roll call to begin
this evening's meeting.
>> Chair Miller
>> here. Thank you. Vice Chair Will Coxson
>> here.
>> Thank you. Commissioner Marman
>> here.
>> Thank you. Commissioner Pankeritch
>> here. Thank you. Commissioner Kofile
>> here.
>> Commissioner Cardella here. Thank you.
Commissioner Davis
>> here.
>> Thank you. We have a quorum.
>> Thank you. Spoken comment is being
accepted for agenda and non-aggendaized
items. The request to speak forms must
be submitted no later than 90 minutes
before the start of this meeting. Do we
have any spoken comments?
>> Chair Miller. We do not.
>> Thank you. Written comments are being
accepted for agendaized and
non-aggendaized items and should be
submitted electronically at least 90
minutes before the start of this
meeting. These comments are also emailed
to the transportation commission and
posted online. Have we received any
written comments,
>> Chair Miller? We have not.
>> Thank you very much.
So with that, let's take on the first
agenda item, which is the approval of
the meeting minutes of May 15, 2025.
Is there a motion to approve?
I move that we approve the minutes as
presented.
>> Moved by Vice Chair Wiloxen.
>> Second.
>> Second by Commissioner Davis.
>> Miss Conclu, will you take the vote?
>> Yes. Chair Miller.
>> How do you vote? Thank you.
>> What? Vice Chair Wil Cox?
>> Yes.
>> Thank you. Commissioner Marman.
>> Yes. Thank you, Commissioner
Pankerowitz.
>> Yes. Thank you, Commissioner Kofile.
>> Yes.
>> Thank you, Commissioner Cardella.
>> Yes.
>> Thank you, Commissioner Davis.
>> Yes.
>> Thank you. Minutes are approved.
>> Thank you. And now we can get into the
uh the body of this meeting. We will
start with strategic transportation
safety plan initial goals and policies.
Mr. Do would you like to introduce that
or are we going straight to our
consultant?
>> I can introduce the consultant. So once
again we have um Ryan from Ty Lynn
starting the presentation as well as um
uh
sorry
>> yeah I know I was sorry I was stumbling
on
Northern Arizona University Bryant. So
sorry I was I had I was stumbling on the
university thing but sorry our
consultant and and our our experts in
the room to present on our goals and uh
highendry network for today. Thank you.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you again commissioners for having
us. Uh it is a wonderful uh partnership
between TYN and NAU in this endeavor. Uh
and we have been busily working since
our last conversation with you. Um
taking diligent notes and thinking very
mindfully about all of the wonderful
comments that we had last time we met.
Um, great insights, great direction, and
hopefully, uh, we've honored some of
those comments and those insights that
we heard last time we met and we can
have continue to have that productive
conversation today as we take a little
bit more closer look instead of the
highle concepts necessarily and and get
into a little bit more detail that has
risen to the top basically following the
evidence that we see, the data that we
see. And so hopefully that leads to a
productive conversation today.
Uh just as a reminder as to where we
started uh this process was with data uh
ADOT and the city of Scottsdale. We
pulled those data sets together where
their strengths matched best um so that
we could definitely focus on vulnerable
road users. Uh and those cover five
years from 2019 to 2023. Uh the city's
jurisdiction is really what we're most
concerned with with this plan. Uh so we
have removed the state routes. Um
severity of crashes paramounts crash
types uh definitely evaluated trying to
seek out those vulnerabilities uh that
present themselves in patterns geometric
or uh geographic patterns spatial
patterns uh street typology patterns uh
all of this uh comes to us and so we can
look at that statistically and on maps.
So buckle in, it's going to be your
time. Um the safe system approach is
really uh something that's expected out
of this process. This again is US DOT
funded out of the safe streets for all
pro program. Um and so this framework of
a safe system approach is not only um
federally mandated in a way, but it
really is as a community of practice
considered a a productive framework for
breaking apart this complex questions of
what does make for a safer
transportation system. And paramount
amongst the elements there are like
these crosscutting themes about taking
this human- centered proactive approach
is to one identify that human injuries
are significant and our bodies are do
not tolerate high-speed crashes too
well. Um so understanding the dramatic
fatality risk that happens when crashes
occur with the human body between 20 and
40 miles per hour for instance is you go
from a 10% survival rate to
very little survival rate. So 10% or
less our uh survival rate. So um that's
a a significant factor to consider. And
then when it comes to this error
forgiveness, we do have uh a fair amount
of engineering practice that has
informed the way that the transportation
system has evolved over time. And so at
high speeds, a lot of breakaway
equipment and and things that are along
the roadway, the clear zones, if you
will, uh are definitely designed to be
forgiving. Um, and there's probably more
uh yet practice to define along those
lines, but there are also contexts to be
sensitive to where the clear zone is the
zone that we designate to vulnerable
road users. And so it's a it's a fair
question then to be thinking about this
forgiveness because it does become
paradoxical in a sense. And so um I
wanted to prompt this opportunity to
best explain this for the general
audience, best understand it from your
perspective. When it comes to this idea
of forgiveness, at what point does
designing for forgiveness risk the
complacency or room for aggressive
driving, for uh not being
contextsensitive to the prevalence of
vulnerable road users? And so, if you
have any points that you'd like to make
on this topic, uh I'd like to hear your
your viewpoint so that we can capture
your voice in the first draft of our
goals.
Commissioners, Commissioner Kafa,
>> I mean for me, I think forgiveness
outweigh the importance of forgiveness
outweighs worrying about complacency. Uh
from what from what I understand, it's
roadway design that dictates behavior
more than uh you know anything else. And
so if we have a
um so if we have a design that keeps
people and vehicles separate from each
other, we can allow for that kind of
error and not have uh as your safe
system says right prevent deaths and
serious injuries. So um I think that's
that's the most important thing is to
allow people to be people and not expect
that perfect behavior. Um,
>> okay.
>> Thank you, Vice Chair Will Cooken.
>> Um, yeah, and I I've spoken on this
topic before and um, so I'll forgive
forgive me if I repeat myself, but uh,
you know, forgiveness is a really
squishy term and, uh, whenever you're
developing a project, uh, there is a
continuum that you are on. Um the
minimum is the standards of the location
that you're building to the the MAG
standards, the manual and uniform
traffic control standards, and then
beyond that, everything beyond that, it
goes into the the the term substantive
safety or substantial safety. Um,
as you develop individual projects,
there's always downward pressure to move
the project closer to the minimum
because you always run out of money. You
always are squeezing your budget. Um,
and I I' I've found that in order for
there to be
true forgiveness in roadway design, it
really there really needs to be stronger
minimum standards put in place. And
those stronger standards generally are
going to have to come from the community
or the city in this case. Uh, because
there's always the and I don't want to
say bottom because the standards that we
have are good, but they're sort of the
minimum. And if we want to do anything
other than the minimum, that's going to
be the destination whenever we move
whenever we develop a project. So the
question really is not necessarily how
do you keep from that minimum, but you
know you're going to go to a minimum. So
how do you make it so that the minimum
is a little bit better than federal
federal or even regional guidelines? So
I would encourage
um in this process we look at
making standards
better in the city of Scottsdale, making
design standards better than what they
have to be uh through the MAG, through
the METCD, those kinds of things. I
would encourage to try and push the bar
a little bit higher. Uh knowing that
that's where your designs are going to
end up. Um so that's my soap box and I'm
sorry if I've repeated that.
>> That's great. No, thank you.
>> Thank you.
Commissioner
>> um to add to what Commissioner
Commissioner Wilkinson said, I think
that traditionally
um
we confuse uh the term of error or the
forgiveness with driver comfort and they
are two different things. Yet, um,
traditionally when
some engineers design roads, they are
designing them for driver forgiveness
and driver comfort. And it's just really
easy to step out of this country, go to
any other country where pedestrian
activity or bicycling is more prevalent.
And we're going to see that that
forgiveness is given first to
pedestrians, bicycles, vulnerable road
users, and then to drivers because
drivers have a higher responsibility
since they are licensed and driving a
vehicle that could kill people. And I
think that just traditionally uh the
roadway design in this country has been
specifically to move vehicles and not so
much to consider. And we we see this in
design all the time. It doesn't even
consider uh the safety of people
walking. It considers their behavior or
proper behavior first without any
forgiveness for it.
>> Thank you. Any other comments? I just
one comment and doesn't necessarily help
you but you know I think error
forgiveness is is one thing. Um but you
have people who are just
extremely aggressive drivers and no
matter how you design it, they are going
to continue to be aggressive. So, you
almost need to just deal with that on
the enforcement side and have that level
um
where you can't necessarily think about
how many people are going to take
advantage of that. Does that make any
sense? Am I
>> I think I understand. Yeah. Um I think
that your point is
I interpret that point to be most
applicable to very wider arterial
roadways where multiple lanes and free
flow traffic allows for a lot of
aggressive space space to be aggressive.
Um I think maybe where
design uh approaches where the design
enforces safer speeds is more achievable
at the local smaller segment context,
right? And so when we can use the
parking lane to create chicaines or or
these, you know, curb bumpouts that
pinch the lanes so that drivers don't
take that extra space to feel that
they're on a freeway kind of a highway
road condition, right? Where we got 12
plus wide 12 foot wide lanes or or wider
when you don't have the parked cars next
to your suburban, you know, local
street. uh it does feel quite wide and
gives you that permission to drive
without consequence that you feel
personally at risk when driving in this
larger context. Right. So, and does that
match up with what you're trying to say?
>> Close to it. I I just think that there
are also some
>> and
I've encountered them recently a fair
amount of really aggressive drivers that
no matter what kind of design that you
give them they will figure out how to
you know gee get a little air flying
over those humps and things. So
>> Gotcha.
>> Yeah.
>> Okay. Well, there's plenty more uh
slides that probably touch upon this as
we make our way through. So keep this
you know top of mind is this idea of um
who deserves forgiveness. Thank you uh
for that comment. Uh and you know uh
prioritizing safety for for different
users. Um, just for general context, we
will be talking about bringing in speed
tonight, uh, to talk about how that's
affected some of our analysis or the
correlations that we're finding with
regards to speed. Um, and just a quick
primer on the 85th percentile. Uh, this
is a very common metric that's used or
statistic that's used to sometimes set
speed limits uh, in municipalities. Um,
and it it means that, you know, 84
people, if there's 100 cars on the road,
84 drivers are driving at a slower speed
than this 85th person, and then there's
14 other people driving faster, right?
So, it's this conceived spread of speeds
that tend to take a bit of a a normal
curve, if you will, uh where the
peak of average driving oftent times is
around the speed limit or just below the
speed limit um in free flow conditions.
These are this is an important factor to
uh to consider and we are seeing some uh
crash concentrations um looking at the
85th percentile speeds using
location-based data and so we'll get
into a little bit of that. But
this idea of like doing speed studies on
every roadway is becoming more and more
cost effective thanks to uh services
where people are using their GPSbased
navigation systems more and more and
those data are being collected at a high
level. There's no you know information
or information is not uh individualized.
It's very much uh people's privacy are
protected in these uh schematics or
these schemes.
The importance is that you can get a
very wide look at travel patterns.
Average speeds, 85th percentile speeds,
they're relatively representative of
what you can expect on a roadway. Um and
we have been mapping this. And so
perhaps when we think about speeds and
understanding kinetic energy of mass
times that speed squared, um that is a
that is a significant variable um to be
thinking about. And so
location based services data uh is
readily available. Um there's lots of
different uh opportunities. This is not
locked into one service provider. Um and
these average speeds compared to the
85th percentile speeds um sometimes they
can show quite a significant difference
between the two. Um this can be used to
inform where enforcement actually
happens so that you understand the
pattern of aggressive driving versus the
average driver. Um there's plenty of
further analyses that can be used. We've
recently uh put this data together in a
GIS package. Um it does not always come
together in a easily digestible like
plug-and-play uh format. Uh it takes
some data science to to get it ready and
and get it uh matching up with the
street segments to the the crashes to be
on the street segments. understanding if
you're talking about uh behaviors at an
intersection or a segment, driveway
conditions, things of that nature,
turning movements. Um
all that is to say that we are seeing a
strong uh correlation or
um gathering of of crash incidents uh at
the 45 to 50 mph 85th percentile. Um
this alone uh may not say much. There's
a lot that can be misinterpreted by just
looking at 85th percentile across a
system um an aggregate like this. But
none for for better or worse you are
able to see that there this travel
pattern the speed in uh throughout the
Scottsdale system has a concentration
around these speeds and they're kind of
the typical arterial right is is marked
for 45 miles an hour. Um, and some
somewhere in that window just above 45
miles an hour to 50 miles an hour, we're
finding a fair amount of serious
injuries and fatal uh injuries uh in
these crashes.
And just uh on on the screen for
everybody's um memory sake, the all
these crash records that we're looking
at follow the CABco record format.
Everything from fatal injury to s
serious injury suspected, minor injuries
suspected, possible injury, and property
damage only. And majority of our focus
is working within the the K and A
records. Uh to expand our scope a little
bit, we can look at the B crash records
as well. Um, and if necessary, sorry,
there's something wrong with the text on
that column, but
uh, so
when we think about
where 45 mph speeds are uh, within the
city,
sometimes we find that when you look at
the crash, the collision manners that
are stacking up. They're a lot in the
turning movements. We'll we'll talk
about that in a slide. Um there's a lot
of free movements of left turns and
turning pockets and and turn lanes and a
lot of things that are happening at
pretty high speeds on your typical
arterial, right? And so if those se
speed speeds are set to the 85th
percentile just based on how people are
driving, then you could make the
argument that well perhaps there's more
to be considered with regards to setting
speed limits and more fidelity in the
policym to consider speeds more
holistically. So with regards to speed
limit setting practices
85th percentile is context blind right
it doesn't necessarily take into effect
the how many driveways how many turning
movements how what's the spread of the
number of pedestrians that are exposed
to turning movements the number of
cyclists that are exposed to cross those
turning movements. So keeping those
things in mind um help to inform speed
limits. Reinforcing high speeds uh 85th
percentile can sort of feed on itself,
right? You take something that where 84
out of eight out of 100 people are
actually driving slower than that speed
and yet you're setting the speed higher.
So it might encourage the the me the
average driver to to drive a little bit
faster to that speed limit. um
pedestrian safety and and cyclist safety
aren't necessarily considered. So more
considerations, more thinking about
crash history, crash correlations with
the speed and vulnerable road user
exposure are all recommendations that we
would try to make to find additional uh
measurable
key indicators as to the considerations
for setting speed limits throughout the
city of Scottsdale. And we haven't dove
into much history or the the fine the
finer details of how seed speed limits
are set. But given that sort of national
context, the the speeds that we're
seeing within the roadways, do you have
any thoughts in terms of this practice
of the 85th percentile, does do these
concerns of the critic the criticisms of
the 85th percentile resonate with you or
does or are you skeptical of some of
these concerns?
>> Vice Chair Wiloxen.
Um, again, I I speak about these and I I
I actually do set speed limits on the
ADOT system. Uh, and I um
I've always thought that the
um 85th percentile really takes the
control of the road away from the
engineer and puts it in the hands of the
drivers, which is I think giving up too
much control. Um, but having said that,
I also know that just changing the speed
limit without um doing anything to the
road doesn't change behavior, just makes
more people speeding and you can't
really enforce it enough to make sure
that everyone's going to be driving. So
whenever we talk about this, I do think
that the context matters and it's
important that people
um
drive in a row or at the speed that that
we feel is is safe for the context. But
I also know that there are limits to
what we as engineers can do to change
the driving environment. uh lanes need
to be so wide. Um you may or may not
have uh the rightway or the uh the
resources to do things to make the road
drive slower. Uh but I do think that the
85th percentile alone is um
is a bad thing. Um I would heavily push
towards the contacts sensitive uh US
limits something to that effect. uh more
so than relying on the driver behavior.
>> Thank you,
Commissioner Marman.
>> Thank you. Just just for a little
background, how was the 85th percentile
developed over the years? Where did
where did it come from?
>> Highway Safety Manual. Uh
I I I'm a little shaky in terms of the
full history. If you have things that we
should consider in terms of historical
context.
>> Okay.
>> I know it's been a long held practice
statistics.
>> Thank you.
>> Can proceed.
>> Okay. Thank you.
MUTCD. No. So yeah, um all all of these
engineering uh standards have longunning
histories. My colleagues reminded me
that the MUTCD uh offers uh a segment on
it. We can certainly pass along uh more
information about the history around the
85th percentile for your consideration.
Um,
I think that some of these concerns that
I've brought up are part of the the
community of practice is bringing up in
these discussions and so I wanted to
bring them forward to sort of get your
reflections on them because I'm always
trying to ensure that our bias doesn't
shape this plan. We really want your
voices to shape that. So I'm always
looking for does this resonate with you
or does it provide crit like optimism or
skepticism and so always trying to
understand where your heads are at with
regards to some of these best practices
helps us shape it to your wishes. Okay.
Um so with more to this idea that the
roadways can be self-reinforcing of
speeds here are a couple examples. Um, I
know that the practice of all these uh
various practices are found throughout
Scottsdale and uh I think that there's
plenty of evidence that continues to
come forward and our recommendation
would be to continue to monitor and
evaluate these practices so that the
tool set is more robust, more uh
uphold upheld to best practices uh for
the city's practice going forward.
Another tool that's starting to roll out
pretty heavily is automated enforcement.
Um this technology is becoming more and
more affordable. Your neighbor to the
south of you here in Tempee is doing a
fair amount of it. Uh we'll talk about
that. Um, but what I have found working
with your your technical advisory and
working group, this is a
multid-disciplinary team of folks that
work for the city, your traffic
engineers and your police department are
already working very handinand in terms
of where targeted enforcement should be
placed, where automated enforcement
should be placed. They're very much
aware that to do too much might cause a
push back or negative response from the
public. So, they're being very cautious
and only doing it where they're really
100% sure that a the risk uh to the to
everybody on the roadway, drivers,
pedestrians, bicyclists, what have you,
are all at risk. And there's data to to
back that up. and so to be very careful
as they rolling out this. And so I don't
know if you have any um experiences
within the Scottsdale context that you
want to weigh in on, but I can pause if
there is room for concern around photo
enforcement or automated enforcement,
whether that be fixed or the more mobile
units that can be moved about so that
it's not just a repetitive habit that
people know to slow down for that one
intersection, but it becomes a little
bit more of a uh oh, I I'm always having
to be paying attention. always have to
be more self-aware of the speeds that
I'm driving. Is there any thoughts?
>> Commissioner Cafo,
>> um this thought's actually about your
previous slide uh where you're talking
about self-reinforcing
um speed and thing like that. And I was
the uh I read a book on traffic once
where they talked about a city that
basically brought the sidewalks almost
to street level. like there was very
little difference there and I didn't see
that uh mentioned there but I would I'd
be interested in you know making the
drivers I I less comfortable so that
they do uh reduce their speed um when
driving around heav he heavily
pedestrianed areas and things like that.
I was always really fascinated by that
idea and I'd be interested in seeing if
that was how that would fit into the
framework that you're working on right
now. Um, as far as
uh speed cameras and all that, I uh I'm
just I'm all for if if you're speeding,
you you you should suffer the
consequence for it because those speed
even though we've discussed the 85th
percentile isn't a great way to set
speed limits. Um, if you are disobeying
if if you're behaving in a dangerous
manner, I I I would like you to uh
realize the consequences of that.
Commissioner Marvin,
>> thank you. In um non enforcement
situation, how do you collect speed data
generally?
You set up cameras, you set up radar
and just
>> so using this type of technology is is
that the
>> I'm saying in a non- enforcement
setting, you just want
>> Oh, sure. You want speed data generally
and what's being done on the street. I
mean,
>> how how is that done?
>> I know it's commonly technology that's
utilized whenever traffic counts are are
taken. There's additional equipment that
is posted to polls and and that data is
collected. Um, I'm not an expert
necessarily in the technology
um and how it's done, but it's readily
done. Um,
okay. Thank you,
>> Commissioner Davis.
>> Um, I had a some comments about uh the
design of intersections. Would that be
would seem an appropriate point to to
bring those up?
>> Yeah.
>> So, I guess it was on kind of the
previous slide. Um, so I I you know, in
agreement with a lot of the the roadway
design considerations you talked about,
you know, trying to to to to narrow um
if necessary to encourage a slower
speed. Um, I know that some um design
considerations for signalized
intersections I'm generally in favor of
to help reduce pedestrian um uh you know
interactions would be things like um you
know u controlled lefts. So no, you
know, no flashing yellows, right? It's
either red or green. Um potentially no
right-hand turns on red. Um I know
there's a lot of situations people right
will creep out and potentially block
someone who's walking. And then finally,
I think one of our council members
brought up the idea of um increasing um
the yellow the length of the yellow
light um which I know has right been
proven to reduce accidents and um give
people more time to clear the
intersection. So those are design
considerations that I would be um
interested in deploying more.
>> Thank you.
>> Yeah, the intervals of uh the signal
there was actually an article on in the
IT journal recently uh with regards to
that. Um, so there is some interesting
research that continues to come uh
forward and we can definitely make note
of some of those best practices and and
recent research recommendations within
the plan.
>> Commissioner Cardella, thank you. In
reference to the past side slide, all of
those methods that the city has used to
slow down, I think have been great. I've
lived in Scots in my entire life and so
I've seen over the years particularly in
the last decade where they've built more
of these buffered medians and I love a
roundabout and then Scots always makes
everything beautiful with the
landscaping surrounding it. So I
appreciate that. And then more recently
all of the buffered bike lanes I think
are affordable way to really add a lot
of feel of safety. So I think
Scottsdale's been a leader in that and I
would love to see us you know continue
on that path. Um, in terms of the photo
radar, similarly, that has changed over
the years. I feel like it was little
much for a while and then they really
pulled back and have noticed how they're
in using that more often. It does seem
to still be in low speed areas, but it
does feel very targeted like school
zones or maybe areas where neighbors
have had a specific issue. So, I do
think the city has struck a good balance
with that in the past year or two.
>> Thank you.
Um just a a a few comments. Um first of
all, because I am now taking a new route
to my to my office, I have to comment on
the flashing yellow lights anecdotally.
Um
because I have come across flashing
yellow left turns on multi-lane roads
and they tend to be a little
like playing Frogger. Um, but I also,
um, have been, uh, utilizing a flashing
yellow left turn at Third Street and
Thomas where it works really well, but
it's just single lane either way. So, I
think situationally,
um, it can work, but yeah, on the main
roads, it's just a little frightening.
Um, you know, for the for the speed
cameras,
you know, just personal school zones.
Yeah. I mean, that's just scary. We need
to protect the our our children. When
you talk about um human error,
kids are likely to just jump out. We got
to make sure that uh people are are
doing what they need to do there. Um
as far as having them someplace
permanent, I can remember uh you know,
when they were ubiquitous and sure
enough, everybody like slam on the
brakes, here we're coming slow, slow,
slow, slow, slow, speed up. Um,
so I'm not sure how useful those really
are. I mean, it it it slows you down
right there, but does it just push your
accident someplace else?
>> Good.
>> Just for a little uh regional context,
uh, as I mentioned, your neighbor to the
south has been uh, aggressively rolling
out uh, photo enforcement. Um, and
the media coverage has not been uh
making light of the fact that there's a
lot of or citations that have been
coming out of it. Um, nearly 10,000
violations under review with over 2,200
citations that had been issued in just a
two-eek period. Um, and so you follow
the the public sentiments around these
things and there's a perception that the
city's only doing it out of a cash grab
or profit motive. And so these are just
these aren't necessarily truths that I'm
trying to sort of convey here. What I'm
simply stating is that these perceptions
are real uh in the public and the
culture that you establish around safety
is a real consideration. So being
positive minded and and being sure that
the messages that go out around these
issues resonates with residents and the
narrative doesn't get carried away into
something that is built on you know fear
built on you know uh what have you
misguided perceptions. You want to make
sure that you're doing it to build that
positive safety culture in the city is
what my recommendation is. And so again,
I will pause because I don't want to
make that recommendation without hearing
whether or not that promotes skepticism
or optimism from you,
>> Commissioner Penitz.
Um, so we've been talking about the
designing of roads in terms of
roundabouts, raised, crosswalks, and the
the reality of it is where the majority
of the crashes are happening at arterial
intersections where or arterial segments
where the uh speed is going to be
higher. Those design considerations are
not applicable. No one would want to see
them. And this would to me be the
solution unless we narrow in every
arterial street and then everyone is on
their own taking side roads to get to
where they want to go at two or three
times the amount of time it would take
them. Uh this certainly is the solution
um or part of a solution for arterial
roads. And I think that the the piece of
communication of the amount of of
funding that the city uh has to spend
any time that there is a collision.
It's I mean that that citation is a very
small segment of that. And I I know of
many programs, I don't know here in the
valley, but they're just covering the
cost of the the additional staff and
court dockets and judges that it takes
to process some of these citations. So,
I think the the message can be given and
like anything, people could frame it the
way they want to. I I honestly don't
think it's it's a bad cash grab for a
city. That's not the worst way to
collect uh funding from our residents,
particularly those that are breaking the
law and causing collisions that could
cost up to millions of dollars. I mean,
the the cost of human life as calculated
by federal agencies is in the millions.
So, I I really don't see an issue with
it. It's just the messaging around it
and showing that other perspective of
it.
other perspectives,
>> Vice Chair Wilson.
>> Uh, thank you, Chair Miller. Um, so I
guess I would say a couple things. First
of all, uh, if we move forward with
this, and I'm sure assuming we will, uh,
just take heed from the city of Phoenix
program. Uh, it was cut back in
2020, 2019, so I can't remember when. Um
but um some of the things that and it's
recently been re re-established.
So they're bringing the cameras back.
They're bringing the photo enforcement
back at schools. Um but a couple of
things. Uh one is um be open and honest
about the enforcement uh the the budget
and the fact that you're not actually
getting rich because of it, which I I
think the city of Scottsdale's program
is pretty revenue neutral, but I don't
know that most people know that. Um, and
the second thing is, of course, you
know, gez, so long as you have a
methodology that's science-based, I
think you can't really argue with that.
We're putting these photo cameras here
because this is where the we have the
most crashes or this is where we have
the most speeding. But the other thing
that I I've always been curious in
whenever this topic comes up and we have
obviously lots of cities around the
country that have photo enforcement is
um
the uh the programs are really they are
based on fear of getting a ticket, not
fear of, you know, getting involved in a
wreck. Um which you can argue whether
that's a good message or not, but that
is the message. Um because most people
don't think they're going to get
involved in a wreck. Um, most people do
believe that they are capable of driving
faster than they are. Um, but what I'm
I've always been curious on, and this
would be a I think a pretty good selling
point, is beyond the hot spots where you
put the cameras, beyond the
intersections that have red light
running, beyond all that, you know, all
of the infrastructure part, um, what
does it do to the average speeds in
city?
Um, does it, you know, the program is
spot treatment, no matter where you put
it, but does the concept of having these
red light cameras or these speeding
cameras actually make a larger knock-on
effect? Does it actually lower the c uh
the the speeds? You know what the speeds
are on average? And probably most
importantly, does it lower the number of
crashes uh that are happening on your
road? Um, that would be to me the best
selling point. Uh, but it would also be
the um uh I guess morally the better
reason for having uh a photo
enforcement. You're not necessarily
doing it to make money or to pay for the
program or to whatever. You're doing it
because the knock-on effect is much
greater than the sum of the parts. And
if we could show that, and I don't know
of any city that's done that, by the
way, but if we could show that, I think
that would go a long way to drive home
the fact that this is a safety campaign
and it has these effects beyond where we
place the cameras. So,
>> the good news is that the database for
these types of research and
countermeasures is only growing more
robust and better by the year. And so
perhaps we can find crash reduction
factors that, you know, settle this
curiosity of yours. Um, when it comes to
photo radar,
>> thank you,
>> Commissioner Marman.
>> Well, I think there's various ways of
doing these projects. I know if I drive
into Paradise Valley, I'm going to speed
limit
because they have a comprehensive
program. And so you you know that and if
they can develop the program like that,
we should think of their methods and try
and set up a something similar that you
know you're going to have to go to speed
limit. It's just everybody knows.
>> Thank you.
>> And I agree with the vice chair. Um, I
think that it's important that
uh people know why a certain uh photo
enforcement is placed at a certain
place. Uh what's the reasoning behind
it? It's not necessarily I mean because
people are speeding. If they're speeding
and there's hasn't been an accident in
four years, no reason to put that there.
Um, but there also needs to be some sort
of feedback loop, some sort of of, you
know, check in six months, has it
impacted that for that information to
get out and to decide whether to move
forward with some of these. So,
>> so this has all been building towards
>> Excuse me, I I'm sorry,
>> I missed someone. Sorry, Commissioner
Kra.
Sorry, it was something you you said
that kind of triggered a thought in my
head. Uh, when it comes to photo
enforcement, um, I spend a lot of time
on the Scottsdale subreddit and I see a
lot of people constantly posting like,
hey, I got a ticket in the mail. What do
I do about this? And the advice is
always, oh, they Scottsdale sends it out
uh, through a third party, so you can
just ignore it and wait for people to
show up and things like that. So, I
think the um the enforcement
uh I I don't know how all of that works.
I don't know if any of that advice is
valid or not, but everybody seems to be
because it's the internet talking with a
lot of certainty. So, if there are
loopholes that allow you to speed, get
caught, and then just ignore it and
suffer no consequences, uh I would think
that would we need to do more uh in
order to uh actually have there be
consequences for for that speeding or
that red light um running or whatever
else you might get caught on camera
doing. Um because yeah, that that seems
to be the thing. Everybody's got stories
about how they just ignored it and it
just went away. And so um yeah I think
if we do that we need to make sure that
people
uh face consequences for it. So thank
you.
>> Thank you.
>> I certainly uh anecdotally uh understand
uh that loophole of consequences. Um we
can look at that. I I think it's really
comes down to maybe uh
different authorities having to work
together in order to allow for uh
something to you know you go you need to
update your license registration every
so often something like that um might be
an option. We we'll investigate uh look
into uh that a little bit in terms of
feasibility. um not sure uh what uh best
practices are right now uh with regards
to that but I think that's an
interesting matter um and perhaps even
if uh the fine isn't collected uh the
the nerves that it would generate in a
person to like oh I did get caught doing
something whether or not I have to pay
the fine now I have to worry about
paying the fine or not paying the fine
hopefully there's there's some sort of
uh behavioral effect to that.
So when it comes to some of this
conversation, we've been talking about
one primary uh concern out of the safe
systems approach and that's safe speeds.
And I think that that you know came up
out of uh a natural following the
evidence of the crash data that we've
been seeing uh as part of why this
discussion is happening part of because
we know that the high injury network is
occurring on your arterials where the
traffic calming toolkit is the the least
robust and and effective perhaps.
There's lots of things that we can do at
intersections and and things. Uh but
when it comes to speeds and throughout
the segments um some of this uh
enforcement matter some of these
enforcement tech uh certainly come to
mind for a lot of pe people. So we've
been talking a fair amount about that uh
speed but crash trends and and other uh
features of this you know color the rest
of the safe system approach. And so what
we're doing is we're utilizing that
framing of the safe system approach
elements to draft out the rest of our
initial goals that we're going to share
with you right now.
So with regards to our collision manner
trends that are occurring that have the
the fatality or the serious injury
consequence. Uh first off, the angle
that's not a left turn crash uh is
prominent.
The single vehicle crash
uh colliding into something that's not
another vehicle uh is a prominent crash
type. Then we have our left turn crashes
uh that are number three. And the same
ranking is true for KSI crashes as well
as minor injury suspected crashes. We
still we continue to see the same top
three pattern. And so this is just a bit
of a pie chart to help lay out uh those
crash types that you're seeing that
we're seeing.
>> Excuse me. Can you uh define angle
crashes that are not left turns? Are you
talking T-bones? You talking sideswipes?
What do you
>> anything that's not uh rear ended or
front end front end um that's not a left
turn. So they're saying that there was
some sort of right hand turn you want.
Yeah. The T-bone effect.
>> Thank you.
>> Yeah.
Uh so we have within
that you know framework as well we're
continuing to look at different trends.
One thing that stands out in the crash
trends are lighting conditions. Um,
between the number of serious injuries
and fatalities or the proportion of
serious injury in in total, you know,
when we move from all crash types to
just the ones that are fatal or serious
injuries, we see a 17 point jump in the
dark lighted condition.
And so
perhaps speeds or enforcement or
something should occur differently in
the night. Maybe the lighting uh policy
itself may not be robust or or following
best practices when it comes to lighting
intersections or
there's lots of things that are at play,
right? And so and there's different
contexts that are at play within
Scottsdale. Majority of these crashes
are occurring in the downtown and
Oldtown central portions of of
Scottsdale. Your pedestrians that are
struck in the dark lit condition are
significant in these areas. So, we're
going to continue to to evaluate that um
for for more recommendations, pointed
recommendations.
Contextualizing some of these crash data
is also important. When we talk about
contextualized
street design, construct contextualized
speed limits, another aspect of
contextualizing is just how are you
evaluating the crash in the first place?
Do you have a contextualized look at the
crash? Are you doing a bit of a crash
lab analysis, if you will, um with with
folks in a room? Um so, oh, it looks
like we don't have a video in this
version. Um I do have this demonstration
that I can share with you. There's um
there's a demonstration that I had
prepared where you take the GIS data
that looks pretty point data. It's just
very two-dimensional. You can see it on
a you know lines on a map.
You don't get a good grasp of the the
context of all in all three dimensions.
You don't see where the trees canopies
are. You don't see where the the signal
arms are or the overhead lights
necessarily are within the street. Maps
all tell or emphasize different stories,
different data. And so one idea to help
bring more context contextual analysis
into crash uh assessments or you know as
a team as a multi-disiplinary team
something that's already being built and
and exercised in the working group is to
output the GIS point data pull it into
Google Earth
rotate around the the conditions of the
site so that you're able to understand,
you know, where the curbs are, uh how
wide the approach lanes are, the the
turning movements could be. Uh
understanding the the context in this
finer finer granularity is helpful.
There's one example that I I wish I
could demonstrate uh for you um where
there's a local road. It's coming into
Miller and it it comes with a narrative.
If you were just to to take a look at
the coding of the crash data, you would
think that it's just a pedestrian maybe
that crossed the street and was crashed
into by a vehicle, but it's a serious
injury. So, it's it warrants like more
attention, right? You're like, "Okay,
this is this is one of those KSI
crashes." So, you look into the the
crash record, it actually has a
narrative, and the narrative has the
explanation that, you know, there was
this high-speed left turn from a vehicle
and somebody was on a scooter, you know,
approaching the intersection in their
lane and the the fast turn movement end
up hit being a hit-and- run incident of
this person on a scooter. And so when
you when you get that kind of
information, then you're able to to look
at the built conditions of the
intersection and ask yourself, should
these high-speed arterials that make
their way into a neighborhood
be a, you know, should that left turn
movement be slowed through using
countermeasures, using design methods of
maybe a physical center median that
helps slow or force the the turning
movements to be a little slower, things
of that nature. So all this is is to
suggest that when you're able to move
about the map in a 3D nature, you get a
better feel and a better understanding
of what's occurring in these situations
and a pattern emerges to say that this
could be not just a maybe a spot
treatment, but because this pattern is
occurring in a multiple instances where
the typology of the high-speed arterial
that intersects with the low-speed
neighborhood local road needs to
consider Consider the mindset of the
person who was just going 45 miles an
hour that has to change their mindset
that they're moving into a neighborhood
and what can we do to prevent the
serious injuries or the fatalities of
you know people that are in this calmer
setting uh not thinking that there's 45
mph car that's immediately coming
through the intersection. So it's it was
this demonstration is meant to to
illustrate that this these types of
tools are available. Google Earth is not
something that requires a paid
subscription. the GIS software that your
city is using has the output methods
that easily drop these sorts of point
crashes into a map and you're able to to
sort of zoom around and see uh the
crashes and and with more richness and
context and I think it's even more
approachable for a lay person who
doesn't have a lot of crash analysis uh
background to get a a warmer or deeper
feel for uh the context of the crash.
Um, sorry again. I I had a video
prepared in the slide. It looks like it
didn't make it into the slide deck. Is
there uh any questions or would you uh
raise a hand like me to make sure that I
email you uh an example of this?
Commissioner Penguins.
>> Um I just have a comment because I I do
find it useful, but I think there can be
different solutions to analyze a crash
and uh certainly looking it looks like
what you're talking about right now is
uh kind of an understanding of the built
environment.
>> Yeah.
>> But I will give you two examples. Um
for example, Scottdale Road where it
splits into drink water. If you go there
any time in summer, um, when it's still
hot, but you're starting to get more
tourists going into the hotels in that
area, you will see that they come to
that point where there is no sidewalk.
They see a lot of shade on the other on
the west side uh of Scottsdale Road
that's there because of new buildings
that were built. They're not that new
anymore. And you will see time and time
again people crossing. And that's like
more of a behavioral way to look at
crashes that also needs to be
understood.
>> My other example, um, you know, when
when I worked in a position in
pedestrian safety, I recall a police
officer
telling calling me telling me, "You have
to see the video of this person getting
hit. It is absolutely ridiculous. He
jumps in the middle of traffic." And I
sat with him and I watched the video.
was 27th Avenue in Camelback. He did not
understand why that person was crossing
into traffic. But if you were to watch
the video, you could see the man getting
off of a bus on Camelback and then
signaling to a ba bus on 27th Avenue not
to leave and then crossing the street in
the middle of August at around noon or
100 p.m. So um I think there are also
socioeconomic
um ways to study this that have to do
with where are your highest boarding
areas or buses, where are those
transfers happening that provide even
more context. So you have a context
that's uh the built environment. You
have a context that's just us being
people trying to cut corners because
that's what we do evolutionarily. And
you have that socioeconomic context
where your time is money. And if you're
constantly, you know, losing your
transportation um
time and time again and your chances to
get into transportation, you're more
willing to take those risks, especially
in the middle of August. So those are
also tools that I want us to consider
because there most of us have the
privilege of having a vehicle and not
having those other elements ever uh have
to be considered when we look at a crash
and we try to figure out what happened.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you.
>> Um
so behaviorally uh thank you for the
comments. Um, and we respond to a lot of
things in the built environment uh with
our uh behaviors, right? And so you
brought up uh shade and so that can be
one of those things that you appreciate
when you look at uh uh the context in
3Ds, right? Like you actually see the
threedimensional trees and how lush it
is on one side of the street versus the
other and you might be able to explain
the motives of why somebody took such a
a risk behavior. Um so thank you
All right. Um, again, the the traffic
calming tools are are robust. Um, and
we're looking to make sure that what we
recommend. We're going to help
prioritize some of the tools based on
the crash and collision patterns that we
see. But as I think was already stated
today, we're going to see in our high
injury network that a lot of this
happens along the arterials. So there's
sort of a a two frame approach that I
think is going to frame our
recommendations. One's going to be based
on the high energy network that you're
going to hear about soon. The other one
is going to be about more the
neighborhood connection and what the
neighborhoods themselves uh are willing
to evol how they want to evolve their
street and localize uh their priorities.
And so that's going to come through, you
know, hands-on interactions and doing
these in engaging walking assessments
with community members. Uh we've tried
to identify neighborhoods where we're
are we are seeing some neighborhood
crash uh statistics where there's a
strong draw from a school or a community
center. Um and we're going to address
those within the the questionnaire that
goes out to the the broader public
public as well. Um, so again, think of
this as like a two-tier prioritization
process. One that's based on high injury
networks and one that's a little bit
more locally contextualized and wanting
to know where the communities the the
local communities and neighborhoods uh
want to see uh the evolution of feeling
safe in their neighborhoods, feeling
like they don't have that traffic noise
outside their window. like if there's if
there's a strong uh appreciation for
that in certain neighborhoods, we want
to be able to hear and engage with
people um that have that strong desire.
Um so again, this all comes out of a
commitment to saving lives. Um, one US
DOT requirement that I cannot uh miss
tonight with you all is the emphasis
that we do need to have some goal
statement in there that says that we are
going to reduce our fatalities and s
serious injury crashes by a certain rate
by a certain year. And so we're going to
do the best that we can to come up with
the crash typologies that are most
prevalent within our prioritization,
understand the crash modification
factors that can be applied to said
crashes over a course of years and then
be able to
come up with a solid estimate as to what
that rate could be. But what I is more
of a directional question for this body
is what year do you think that that's
best achieved by? Should we have a
10-year window, a 15-year window, a
20-year window? What would you like to
see in terms of window that puts a real
goal uh for us to to set
be 2035, 2040, 2045?
>> Commissioner Kofa.
Um I'm trying to remember the exact uh
because I think in order to reduce that
we would need to look at the life cycle
of roads that that we have here, right?
And so I'm trying I'm trying to remember
I think it's uh did what what is our
typical life uh life cycle of a road
here here in Scottsdale before we re
redo it or re Yeah.
>> Uh thank you Commissioner Kell. Um the
CPM the CIP stands sets it at about 20
year life cycle for a roadways at least
that's what we established at the
beginning of when we're doing a roadway
reconstruction.
So it seems like 20 years would unless
we are going to
be more active we would need to be shoot
for something over 20 years then I think
I mean I know there's a constant
uh there there's a constant like you
know we're always working on one road's
19 one road's five years old so there'd
be there but I think for a citywide it
would seem unless I'm unless I'm not
understanding that it would have to be
something around 20 20 to 25 years I
think.
>> Vice Chair Wilox.
>> Uh yeah, I mean it it's uh the question
really is um I think are we going to be
aspirational? Are we going to pra be
pragmatic and um I'm always much more
for
um aspirational.
Um, it's really hard to make a uh it'd
be really hard to make a
slogan
out of that example.
>> Hey, 35% reduction by 2035. Let's go.
Come on. Um, I think we should we have
an opportunity to be aspirational here.
And I would I would argue very strongly
that whatever year we pick um that crash
number should be 100%. Um and the year
can be something that people can
visualize
without it being next year. Um so 100%
by 2050
would be my vote.
Commissioner Marman, sorry, I was doing
math in my head.
>> Thank you. I think Commissioner Will
Coxin summed it up a little while ago
saying that everybody with a driver's
license has an opinion.
And
so communications of what we're doing is
just is just vital because from personal
experience with various traffic issues
with come up in the city, there's just
no understanding of safety versus
personal convenience.
And I think we need a very strong
program to get this message out that
we're a team here and we're trying to be
safe.
>> Thank you,
>> Commissioner Davis.
>> So, I might be a little bit of a
contrarian here. Um,
how often will this will this I guess
our document be revised, Nathan? Is this
like the the transportation action plan
is every five years ballpark?
>> 10 years. But yeah,
>> 10 years. Sorry. Okay.
>> No worries.
>> Um I would
envision this being we finish up this
document and then when the tap comes up
for renewal, it would be along with that
to be incorporated or brought into that
plan. So minor revisions there cuz we're
not too far away from that
>> to roll it up into that.
>> My only fear about doing a a long-term
goal is that it's tough to measure
incremental progress that way. Um you
know people could just
I guess defer and defer and defer and
we're not making progress and we expect
to make it all up at the end. I'd like
to see a good alignment between the the
our percentage and year here align with
the tap because that's really the way I
think that most of these goals will be
will be made by engineering is my
assumption and redesign and that's how
we're actually going to execute it. Um
10 years probably feels right.
Um I don't know if 35%'s realistic. I
probably would would be interested to
see what are achievable goals made by
cities of of similar size to us with
similar traffic volumes. Um because I
again I imagine if it's engineering
driven that the percent reduction will
be determined by how much money we have
really really to put into our our our
roadway reconstruction. And
um I don't know what's I don't really I
don't I don't know what's certainly
being aspirational is good but I don't
know what's achievable.
So I guess before like I guess making a
number here I would be I would love to
find out again what are some
what are some achievements that perhaps
10P has done or Phoenix or again cities
outside the Phoenix metro. Thank you
>> Commissioner Cardella. I would agree
with the shorter timeline of that 10 to
15 years. I think especially right now
the city seems to be making a huge
investment in transportation. So in the
next decade there's potential to have a
quicker impact I think as long as if
safety really was a focus there.
any other comment
and
I'd kind of like to I won't say split
the difference but to to do both. Um you
know when you say something will happen
by 2050 honestly my first thought is
well I'll be dead I won't see that but
it's nice to have that. So maybe it's uh
you know whatever that percentage is
reasonable to reduce it within 10 years
with the goal of having it completely
gone by 2050
>> and the further that we go out the more
of a crystal ball it is right so uh
technology is going to change people's
fleets are going to adopt the best
technology that we have for emergency
braing and things of that nature. Uh
today and in 20 years we don't know what
the technology necessarily will be. So
um it's it's you know a little shorter
time frame I think gives us a stronger
um target to to maybe hold to and maybe
not defer uh out as I think it was
mentioned. Um but certainly
understanding the difference between
pragmatic and aspirational um is
something that I'm hearing uh from the
commission. uh something that we can
also test within our questionnaire as
well. Um along these lines, if I'm
hearing that there's a little bit of two
minds coming from the commission, we can
definitely make sure that we build that
into the questionnaire that goes out to
the broader public and then let you all
see what the the questionnaire reveals
in terms of public preference on these
lines too. And we could certainly with
the feedback that we've gotten right now
come back with some some concrete
examples of you know one side of being
aspirational, one by being pragmatic and
then a little bit of a mixture of both
and come with a with a a vote and a
consensus on on how we'd like to
proceed. So after we do the
questionnaire, we can take what we've
heard here, do the questionnaire,
combine it together, and come with some
some uh material to vote on coming in
the future.
>> Thank you. Yeah. And definitely coming
back with uh sim similar cities to
Scottsdale with what's been achieved I
think is is a is perfectly reasonable
ask to help give you some more context.
All right. Um we'll kind of get through
these I think relatively quickly. These
really kind of high level uh goal
framings. If there's something that you
jumps out at you that either extreme
skepticism or extreme optimism queue in
let me know. Uh but generally we'll be
building around these themes. Design
being appropriate using appropriate
infrastructure to reduce likelihood and
severity of of road users of all types.
Being more context sensitive uh giving
tools for context uh analysis. Um
lighting and visibility seem to be uh
coming forward uh with an number of cues
that is drawing our attention. Um
crosswalks uh how do we make them more
uh readily available for pedestrians
nationally. 75% of pedestrians are
having fatal crashes
outside of the intersection. Right. A
lot of times that's people trying to
make it across uh a significant roadway
uh without the protection uh or proper
marking or or signalization.
Um
so signal spacings, crosswalks, all that
comes into play. Safer people comes into
that behavioral side that was mentioned.
Uh, one thing that is in high
concentration are DUI uh, markings
within the crashes happening within the
downtown and Oldtown. Uh, perhaps
there's more focus that can go into the
campaigns and messaging uh, in those
contexts. How how do you partner with
uh, some of those situations, some of
those key partners that can help convey
uh, the importance of not driving under
the influence?
um
education you know previous direction
that we've heard is like that should be
less of a concern I think also our
community of practice uh of people who
are standing before commit bodies like
this often are saying that education and
enforcement have always been too heavily
uh relied upon but nevertheless still
play a vital role um when pointed uh and
and data driven. Um, so going to
continue to uh do that and I think that
there was a great recommendation too in
terms of you know trying to find
partners with car rental uh you know
companies and what sort of messaging um
can be provided to them.
Um safer vehicles that comes into play
too. How does the city manage its fleet
over the course of time? Uh can be one
of those questions that this document
helps to at least provide some evidence
as to the types of technologies that are
coming out and that it's a worthwhile
investment for the city. It's always
been or you go back 20 years, I think
cities were very constrained by uh you
responsible use of taxpayer dollars,
right? was the the roll up windows and
the you know no bells or whistles at all
on on city fleet vehicles. But hopefully
you know these types of technologies are
worthwhile investment. It's not just
thinking about the the comfort of the
the staff person who's using it but also
has a fair amount to doing uh some
safety uh for that. There's also right
sizing the vehicles not over bloating
the the vehicle that's being used by the
person that's just going to a site
visit. you know, do they really need the
4-tonon SUV? Um, that type of thing. So,
there's some common sense
recommendations that I think uh can just
create a bit of a checklist um that
might not be uh as as aware um to some
of the processes that are in place. Uh
then postcare crash. This is something
that again the community of practice
feedback is that this component is often
underrepresented but a significant uh
feature for survivability of uh
instances.
We haven't necessarily got into a lot of
in-depth conversation with the technical
working group but I can tell you that we
have already gotten some good engagement
from police from fire. They're very
active within our working group and
we're going to continue uh to work with
them. so that we understand how to keep
them safe and balance, right? Um and if
perhaps if there's any sort of
provocation that I have for this body is
is there any um guidance that you can
provide in this balance between quick
response or traffic calming? There's
sometimes there's a a bit of a uh a p
push and pull between street design and
emergency responders.
Commissioner,
uh, just a comment and it's not
necessarily about the sign, but this is
a an opportunity for that public
awareness where it doesn't turn into us
against them. If police can do a quick
video training on how to respond when
you're a witness to a crash, help save a
life. We're all a team. For example,
like if a pedestrian is hit, you know,
stop your vehicle. Are are the
conditions safe? Here's um be aware of
bystander effect. Call 911, you know, uh
whatever you do to help. And that brings
more um as as we think of traffic
campaigns, this is one that rarely gets
touched upon. And I've been in so many
crash scenes where everyone's just
watching but no one's really helping or
doing something. And these are ways that
we can create that message of we're all
a team. We're here to save lives. This
is one component of it and this is how
you do it if you're ever in that
situation because that's not really
thought about. And it's something that
really bugs me. You know, sometimes I
see crash scenes, particularly on the
freeway, where people just get out of
their car like they are in a 25 m an
hour road and they're just walking
around and it just would take one person
distracted to kill them. So, all of
those are good um ways to um spread that
message.
>> Great.
Vice Joe Wilson
saw you first.
>> Uh yeah, on the um postc crash care,
we're struggling with this on the state
level as well. And one I would uh I
would recommend is uh possibly getting
the emergency responders involved from
the standpoint of um um
changing uh changing nature of vehicular
injuries. Um, if you're inside a car
these days, you're and even if you're
not belted, you're probably going to
survive a lot better than if you were
outside. But the weight, size, and um,
frequency of vehicles that are hitting
pedestrians or people who are involved
in crashes and are now outside their
vehicles are much different than when
they were than they were when modern
emergency medicine was developed. Um
there are different injury types that
we're seeing more of now than we were
say 20 years ago. And knowing that and
being able to uh maybe develop protocols
for EMS uh for triage and for treatment
uh might help with postc crash care. So
um look to the medical industry, medical
field, and the first responders.
>> Thank you,
>> Commissioner Kofa.
I had a couple of thoughts. Uh, one of
them was on a previous slide. We were
talking about uh vehicle speeds.
Um, and or and I was thinking I I I'm
trying to remember. I think there are
some studies that show that slower
speeds can actually get you someplace
quicker because slower speeds allows for
more efficient use of the road surface
since you don't have to have three car
lengths in front of you. You you know uh
2 seconds at 10 miles an hour versus 2
seconds at 70 m hour is a lot different
space and uh and crashes will go down
during that. And so overall, I think
there is when when you're looking at
this and you're looking at speeds, if if
you can if if that if I'm not mis
misremembering that um I think there is
some some room to increase road
efficiency by decreasing speeds on
there. And so I I don't think that's
necessarily the trade-off that that uh
that some people would intuitively think
uh is there. you know, it's also easier
to get onto a street if you're if you're
turning onto it when the speeds are
slower. So, um it seems like there might
be some some ways like uh like like you
highlighted, look for win-wins. Uh and I
think that that would definitely be one
of them.
Uh the other one you mentioned
education, especially school education.
Uh, I grew up in the uh time of DARE and
that was a huge joke to uh all the
college-aged kids and now all of my
nieces and nephews and all the kids I
know who are in school. You know,
there's nobody who doesn't know that you
shouldn't drive uh you shouldn't drink
and drive. You shouldn't drink and while
under the influence, they just don't
care. And so the most impactful
education for me was uh I was in stopand
go traffic and there was a sensor
telling me my door was open. I had a sl
I had a van was a sliding door and it
just kept popping open while I was
stopping and I just looked away for half
a second and ended up rear ending the
person in front of me because I was
going like two miles an hour. It wasn't
a big deal. But that that drove home the
importance of keeping the attention on
the road more than uh than all the DARE
and other uh educational programs that
uh that I was subjected to in school
which were really just a way to get out
of class. And so if we are going to do
educational components, um I think you
know utilizing tools we can to really
put somebody in the situation uh is
better than than something like trying
to educate people that like you know
drinking and driving is bad, speeds go
going fast because every single almost
every single person I know uh knows that
uh that they are an above average driver
and that uh everybody else who who is a
fast driver is a bad driver, but they
have the skills in order to avoid
crashes and stuff. So, I think if if
there is education, it needs to be a
more real life situation. Maybe uh you
know I know there's like I've seen
videos of like uh school school bus or
but bus and uh truck sim simulations and
things like that and I think that would
be the the way I would want to go if
there is going to be an educational
component is definitely something more
real life rather than just being like
hey you know if you go if you hit
somebody at 35 miles an hour that person
is probably going to die probably won't
have much of an effect on the average
Commissioner Marvin,
>> thank you. Will a work work zone safety
be part of another discussion in your
report?
>> Yeah, that's definitely part of safer
people um and work zone habits and
policies that can be in place. Um
we're working together in a working
group that is multi-disiplinary. will
ensure that we have an agenda item with
those who are involved in roadway
construction and understanding what
their confidence level basically in
terms of whether they have the guidance
and the policies that help keep them
safe um and hear directly from those who
are implementing the the work zone um
design here.
>> Right. Well,
I have two comments about work zone
safety.
>> Okay. Um the first one is I don't think
any pavement under construction should
be left without markings overnight or
over a weekend.
Even a dot of paint is put there. A
blank pavement
just invites chaos. The second thing is
there seems to be locally a difference
between
public maintenance maintenance of
traffic and private maintenance of
traffic when there's construction and I
think we need to set standards that make
sure that I call private meaning a
developer project that that maintenance
of traffic meets the appropriate
standard.
Thank you.
>> You any other comments?
>> Chair Miller, um
Commissioner Bob Mman, that's a good
question. So um any project, any
construction project um in the public
right away has to be per our standards
regardless if it's the um private
development or the CPM projects or any
water projects. So, we have our staff
review those traffic control plans and
approved if per our standards and
disapprove if not.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you.
>> While we're on that topic, may I ask a
follow-up?
Uh is there
evaluation or assessment of whether or
not the construction zone
design has been implemented properly?
Um, that's a good question and that's
also related to one of the new ordinance
that council has just recently passed
and this is also to answer your question
to um c um commissioner Marman
about the market um new pavement has to
have
striping and we are doing that. I think
we haven't been doing that, but we're
tweaking the standards and trying to
have more closely attention to it. So,
that's that's to answer your question.
And um the traffic control, there's
always improvement that we need to make
and we're working on that too. It's not
just going to take one staff or one
group. is going to take a collective um
group efforts such as inspection
services, inspectors, our traffic
control staff, and everybody else to
make it happen.
>> Well, I I'm I'm more referring to work
in progress. We have a pavement project
and it just left overnight or a weekend
with no striping while the work is in
progress.
>> Okay. And um
>> there needs to be some way to delineate
>> the line with even a water-based paint.
So at least people have a thought. They
know where they're going.
>> Um do you have the example like you're
talking about today or previous projects
that you saw?
Well, the example I'm thinking about is
um
cactus between
um 90th and
94th when that was under construction
there would be duration where there
would be pavement but no markings
overnight and over a weekend.
>> Yeah. So the previous project or
>> so
>> it's a previous project.
>> Yes. So right now the new standards that
we have implemented is that every new uh
piece of pavement
completed we have to have striping.
Either it's going to be
um temp stripe or we also have
barricades. We also have the what we
call it gypsils markers
as a temporary
um delineation devices.
Okay. Thank you.
>> Thank you,
>> Commissioner Benitz. Um, one quick
question. Are these goals uh about each
of your topic areas for safe systems
going to be incorporated into the plan
as they are?
>> There's more these are more thematic.
Okay. Um, and I'm looking for any sort
of specific feedback that you all have
to to tell me where the emphasis might
be focused on. will also be able to
glean a fair amount from the
questionnaire that's going out to the
public and some of the behavioral um
observations that we make during the
walk assessments will also inform a
little bit more detail about these these
goals.
>> Okay, just then a quick um comment on
safe roads. Um I think maintenance and
maintenance schedules should be
emphasized and looked at in uh from an
organizational perspective in terms of
for example if you have a high injury
network are all your lights operating at
night uh street lights or you know how
often are markings uh refreshed and and
things like that. Thank you.
>> Thank you.
All right. Um so that really concludes
uh this segment of the
presentation. Um the I I alluded to this
earlier. It's on the slide now that um
our path forward right now the way that
we see the first draft coming out is
really coming up with two prioritization
lists when it comes to the engineering
emphasis of this document. uh that the
high- injury network provide some
capital improvement priorities and then
the neighborhood traffic calming also
have a list and these can be tiered in a
way that's provides some flexibility but
they understand that tier one is is high
level uh of importance. Tier two is uh
let's make our way through tier one as
best as we can before moving to tier
two. And then tier three is you know
like maybe as a
simple initiative or um there's already
maintenance happening there. What what
little things can we it's already on our
high injury network or it's on our on
our list. What can we do um that's low
cost but effective? So, um that's kind
of the direction that we feel that we're
going today. Um again, lots of crashes
uh occurring at the 45 to 50 mph of the
85th percentile. Um that's got our
attention. We're mapping that more
spatially so that we understand the
patterns uh as how that relates um to
certain corridors. Scottsdale Road,
there's going to be plenty of maps
coming up, so I won't belver that point.
Um and then just uh
lighting conditions uh seem to be
heavily prevalent uh in the um Oldtown
and downtown uh se sections of the of
the city. Um so we're going to see what
we can do to um make that more aware
that better marked um maybe uh provide
better safer conditions uh for people in
those environments. Um, so those are
going to be some of our our high-end
recommendations at this point. Um, we'll
get into more specific goals with the
draft plan. Um, but I'll I'll pause here
to allow for any other uh final feedback
uh before we get into the high injury
network.
>> Uh, thank you so much. But I do have a
question because uh as an agenda item,
this is listed as information and
possible action. We've certainly have
given you a lot of feedback on this. Is
there a a particular
action you would like us to take?
>> If we came to a consensus on the the
overall goal, we could have taken an
action on that one or any particular
goal that somebody would like to take an
action on, we can do that. But that's
why it's possible action. The other one
coming up is much more in line with with
a possible action of which methodology
do we want to support moving forward. So
if if there's no strong uh feeling about
the the goal like we we came up with in
our um discussion, we can come back
later and and have that be an action
item in a future date. So I think we I
think our our direction was to come back
with um more concrete examples and then
have that action item in an upcoming
transportation commission meeting. If I
may though just sort of uh give a quick
look at the commissioners to make sure
that they all feel that we're on the
right track here, right? There is that
consensus that
we're moving forward and we really
appreciate the presentation and all the
work that you've done so far. Is there
any final comments or questions on this
part? Commissioner Kafta,
>> I just had a quick comment. I think it
was on slide nine when you're talking
about road design for self-reinforcing
speeds. I've noticed uh Tempe is doing a
is updating it's doing work on uh Miller
Road and I'm looking at it versus the
way that we have Oak designed and
there's a image at the top there for you
when you have like curb extensions or
narrowed lanes. And so that's those kind
of like triangle parts that pop out from
the sidewalk. Um and in on Oak on Oak
Street there's a gap and in your image
here there's a gap where like a bicycle
can go through. Um Tempe is just
building them straight so they go right
to the sidewalk. So if you do build
something like that in uh it'd be nice
to have it uh have an escape route for
if you're if you're on a bicycle. So
>> building on the success of oak is your
preference. what
>> building on the success of oak I hear is
your preference.
>> Yeah.
>> Okay.
>> I just wanted to highlight that just
seeing the image there. So thank you.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you. It's very informative
discussion. I appreciate all the
pointers.
>> Next we have the strategic
transportation safety plan high injury
network.
All right. Thank you, uh, commissioners.
Glad to be back again. Uh, so I'm going
to go over, uh, relatively briefly some
concepts around the high injury network
that we've been discussing, uh, for for
Scottsdale. Um, and just Ryan already
mentioned this, but just another
reminder, the high injury network really
is focused on addressing those fatal and
serious or incapacitating injury
crashes. So, we're focusing on uh KN&A
or KSI uh crashes when we talk about
this this high injury network.
Um, so just a um brief overview. I I
think last time we were here, we gave
you a a kind of highle summary of the
crash data we've been working with. We
we've got our vehicle crash data from
AOT. We supplemented that with our
vulnerable road user or our pedestrian
and bicycle crash data uh from City of
Scottsdale. Um, you'll see that the
speed data that that Ryan uh mentioned
previously came from a company called
Replica. Again, it's based on connected
vehicle um and GPS uh data that's
anonymous but gives a high sample of
speeds um across all hours of the day uh
across the city. And um
uh again, we're focusing on city-owned
roadways. So essentially we're we're not
considering the the 101 as part of our
our high injury network. Um and so
really what what is a high injury
network? Essentially what we're doing
here is a network screening exercise. So
we're screening the network of
intersections and segments in Scottsdale
um to look for intersections and
segments that may have safety issues.
Another way to think about it is we're
looking for intersections or segments
where there's um an opportunity for
improvement, high opportunity for safety
improvement, right? And so there are uh
several different ways you can conduct a
network screening exercise and we'll
talk through a few of them that we have
examples on here and then maybe get your
feedback on on a direction to go.
So
the HIN ultimately the goal here is
we're we're prioritizing segments and
intersections to save the lives of
people on the roadway and prevent
injuries injuries. That's of course the
the high level goal. Um and then
whoops
there are different ways to weight the
way that we prioritize our segments. Um,
we can look at we can well I I'll go
through some of these in more detail
shortly, but we can look at purely just
crash counts. Uh, we can look at crash
rates, KSI crash rates you see there. We
can also do other calculations. We can
look at the monetary cost of crashes at
a certain location based on uh state
adjusted crash costs by severity. I'll
I'll go over that briefly. Um, so there
again there are a bunch of different
methods. I'll I'll go through some of
them here and then and then maybe ask
for some feedback or discussion before
we actually get into uh the different
HIN um strategies. I guess this is just
to show you an example. Um this is the
data that Ryan was talking about that
came from replica. You can see we've
mapped uh 85th percentile speed here and
overlaid that. I know it's maybe a
little bit hard to see, but you can see
the dots there are are KSI crashes
across the city. A lot of them are on
those kind of orange and red arterials.
Um
more Okay, thank thank you.
Yeah, there. So, the zoomed in view you
can see here. Um,
and again, we're we're seeing that
correlation as Ryan mentioned, you know,
higher speeds. We're seeing higher
concentrations of KSI crashes. Um, just
a note on these maps. So, this average
85th percentile speed is the speed
across an entire year. I believe it's
2024 is what we have. Um, across all
hours of the day and across all days of
the week. Um, but the table that Ryan
showed earlier, we actually matched the
day of week that the crash occurred and
the hour that the crash occurred to the
hour of speed data and day of week in
the replica data. So that was a more
detailed kind of correlation that you
saw earlier. This is a highle summary of
those of those speeds.
And of course, we see the high
concentration in in the south part of
the Oldtown downtown uh as as Ryan
mentioned earlier.
So, getting into the actual uh you know,
options for our high injury network.
Um four four options I'm going to go
through here. First one, um just the
most basic. We're ranking uh starting
out with intersections here, right? So,
we have our our list of intersections
throughout the city. We've mapped our
crash data to those intersections, the
KN&A level crash data. Um, and we can
just rank those intersections just by
the total frequency of K&A crashes that
have occurred over our analysis period.
Um, and that that I that does tell us
something where we're seeing the most
the highest frequency of those crashes,
but what we're missing there uh is
really traffic volume. So we're not
accounting for exposure when we just
look at frequency. So for example, if
you have two intersections that both
have 20 crashes and one has, you know,
10,000 vehicles per day, one has 80,000
vehicles per day, this lower volume one
with the same level of crashes is going
to have a much higher rate. And so that
volume or exposure piece is what we're
missing kind of with with this method.
But we did go ahead and rank uh 55
intersections based on just KN&A crash
frequency. You can see we've put them
into tiers uh down on the on the bottom
right of the map there where tier one
would be our highest priority locations
where we see the most KN&A level
crashes.
And just looking at
the northern part of the city zoomed in
here, you can kind of get a sense of
where we're seeing the the highest
frequency of these KN&A level crashes.
Sure.
>> Right.
So option two is looking at crash rate.
So this what I just mentioned before.
Now we are accounting for traffic volume
here. So we're normalizing for traffic
volume. So we still collect our total
crash frequency, but then we calculate
our rate um including traffic volume at
that intersection. Uh so you can see the
the formula at the bottom of this box.
Um I'll just run through it very
quickly. Um this is the standard formula
for calculating traffic crash rates. So
at intersections
um that C is the number of crashes crash
frequency. The N is the number of years
in your analysis period. For us, that's
five years. And the V is the traffic
volume. And then if you're looking at a
segment, it's a similar idea. The only
difference is that you're also
incorporating the length of that
segment. So when we're calculating crash
rate on a segment, we're normalizing for
both traffic volume and the length of
the segment so that we can kind of
compare apples to apples across, you
know, segments across a city. Um so here
is our we ran through the same exercise.
You can see the top intersections
uh based on KSI crash rate. A lot of
them overlap between these methods but
not all. There are some differences that
come out uh as we run through these
different methods. Here's a look at the
the northern part of the city with this
method.
And now
option three. So this is uh this
actually combines a couple of different
methods. Um so if you look at the
formula there for total weight, you can
see what we're doing essentially is
giving a weight of 25 to fatal crashes,
10 to A level crashes and one to B, C or
O level crashes. And so this is in the
highway safety manual. This would be
known as equivalent property damage
only. uh EPDO method where we're
converting fatal and serious injury
crashes into the equivalent number of
property damage only crashes. Right? So
that's the first part of the formula and
then we're multiplying that that by the
KN&A crash rate. Um and so we thought
this kind of uh there's some balance
here because we're giving the higher
weight to K and A level crashes. We're
also giving some weight to to B, C, and
O. those lower level crashes and then by
incorporating crash rate we do account
for that exposure uh the volume at the
intersection and length if we're looking
at a segment um and this those weights
of 2510 and one come from a reference in
the the Ashtto highway safety manual um
the link is there at the bottom uh so we
ran through this calculation for the
intersections again you can see for this
option they're those are mapped out
Again, some overlap between the methods,
but there are subtle differences if we
compare intersection to to intersection.
And then the last method is is ranking
based on crash costs. So, um I think the
idea of crash cost came up in the
previous discussion. Um AOT actually
publishes state adjusted crash costs by
severity level in every year in their uh
traffic crash facts document. Um,
currently the cost of a fatal is
9,515,371.
The cost of an A-level crash, you can
see there, 550,
499. So essentially with this method,
we're just taking each intersection,
multiplying the number of fatalss by the
fatal crash cost plus the number of A
levels times the A-level crash cost. the
highest cost intersection is going to be
at the top of the list, right? And so
again, you can see the map uh for this
method,
southern part of the city and northern
part. And the the tier levels are
something that we you know, the these
are not set in stone. Um there's really
no strict guidance on how to develop a
high injury network. So we certainly can
consider more than 50 or so sites. Um we
can look at you know either two tier
levels or more than three tier levels.
This is really up to us on how we want
to prioritize things or up to you and
and us to to work through it. Um but
this is just kind of an initial idea
with these this three tier system that
we're presenting here.
So this is just just a uh at the uh
option three
method that I that I went through. You
can see the the different intersections
at the uh different tier levels.
And I will say this, this the first one
you see there, North Puma Road and the
intersection with north of Jomax Road,
um that essentially is a driveway to
some kind of industrial thing. It looked
like what happens there, this is kind of
a drawback when using crash rates. It's
a super low volume roadway and so that
even if there's one or two crashes
there, that that spikes up the rate
because of that very low volume. So that
that's kind of an issue to work through
when using crash rates. Um, but just to
give you a sense of of where we're
seeing our top intersections based on
this initial draft method as shown here.
And I'll I stop me any time if there's
questions as well. Um, I think I'll I'll
run through kind of a sim similar thing
with segments, but I do see a question.
Yeah. Um so you have five years worth of
data. Do you recall how many fatal and
how many serious injury crashes those uh
that was in number?
>> I thought I saw like 300 and something.
>> I 300 was the total pedestrian crashes.
I want to say the KSI
was in the 700s, but I'd have to go
back. I don't have the number off the
top of my head.
Is there an appetite to do like a
vulnerable road user uh high injury
network with maybe more years like more
than five years?
>> Uh certainly it's possible. Um we would
for us we'd have to request that from
city of Scottsdale because the data set
we've been working with that we merged
with ADOT was was for those years. Uh, I
think we certainly could set up a
framework and and look at with the data
we have see what a high injury network
for VRUs looked like um and then
supplement that with more years down the
road potentially.
>> Thank you.
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah. Commissioner,
>> just a just a comment. Um when we did
this for the city of Phoenix, we ran
into the same problem that you're
describing with low volume um low volume
intersections and low volume segments.
And uh what it what it took was we just
had to make a decision based on
the population of segments and the
population of intersections. you know,
what were the
bottom 1% as far as volume or bottom 5%
and just excluded those with the
understanding that you might still have
a problem at JOMAX and North Puma. That
is worth looking at, but it does tend to
offset the u um
it does tend to skew the um larger
picture. that's not that's a not a
normal arterial arterial intersection
>> and you don't want necessarily people
focused in on that as as if it were. So
just a comment.
>> Yeah, thank you. Yeah, we definitely
we're seeing that issue for for the
intersection here and on on the segments
um when we get to that shortly.
>> Yeah.
>> Um in your waiting, can you waited? You
said you had a driveway. I mean, is
there a way to weight the type of road
into your equation?
>> Um, I don't know if we can put a a
weight on the roadway type, but we could
look at different roadway types
separately. So, we could we could have a
separate network, high injury network
for arterials only versus collectors
possibly. Um, but really, I guess the
type of road is somewhat accounted for
in the volume metric there.
Yeah,
>> thank you,
>> Commissioner Kile.
>> Um, one of the things that I hear people
talk about constantly is, uh, Arizona's
two seasons. Uh, we have snowbird season
and we have the rest of the year. And
the snowbirds are often, uh, blamed for
a lot of the challenges when when you're
driving around. And so, uh, I don't know
if it would be possible with the data
that you have, but maybe look to see how
many of the crashes happen during our
like winter spring time and how many of
the crashes happen during like the
summer and uh, early fall time or
something like that when the we have a
our more year round population is more
represented on the road. So, I I would
think if that's possible to do, I mean,
I can see you've already gone through
several iterations here, but that that
would be one thing I would keep in mind
is we, you know, we we have that
>> we have that snowbird population that
comes in for a little while.
>> Yeah, certainly. We've uh I think we've
already got our a summary like that
crashes by month. Um, with the high
injury network, we're looking at all
five years, the total of all five years.
So, I don't know how we incorporate the
seasonal
component into the ranking, but we
certainly can look at the the general
trends by by season and and that can
inform maybe different countermeasure
recommendations as well.
>> Vice Chair Wiloxen,
>> just one other thought. Um, again from
my days with the city of Phoenix, um,
you, you know, there's lots of different
ways to look at it to slice and dice the
information. Um, but you also need to be
able to communicate the information to
the people who are not in this room and
who are not necessarily traffic
engineers. Um, but, um, so I I guess I
would say we typically in the city of
Phoenix would either do frequency or
rate, the KSI rate. And I I think those
are that's the rate is kind of where
normal
non-technical understanding sort of
breaks. Uh and arguably it breaks before
then. But if you if you can if you can
argue or if you can convince someone
what a rate is, um I think you can do
that a lot easier than convincing
somebody what a high, you know, highway
safety manual method is or a equivalent
property damage only method is. And I
think it's maybe easier for people to
see frequency or rate as
an understanding a way to way to
understand the information.
Yeah, that's that's a fair point. Thank
you.
>> Yeah, Commissioner Cardella, if
>> I could weigh in on the communications
uh point real fast. Um yes, and the way
that I think
I'll I'll run this draft by you all and
see if it makes sense to the lay person.
When you factor in crash rates,
essentially you're rewarding the success
rate of the amount of traffic volume
that goes through the segment or the
intersection successfully without a
crash.
That would be the way that I would
promote uh communicating that to the
public. Does that make sense?
>> Commissioner Cardell,
>> thank you. I was just going to say I'd
loved the idea of having a monetary
component. I think that um citizens of
Scottsdale on average are more focused
on economics than other pe other cities
honestly. But the idea that that doesn't
have any volume waiting to it I think is
you know doesn't make it a a feasible
measure but I do like that aspect of
kind of the monetary value of the impact
of these accidents as well.
>> Thank you.
Excuse
me. I apologize that I missed the very
first part of this discussion. Um, I
always think of it in terms of your
downside risk. Um, you know, what's my
risk of driving through an intersection
and getting hurt?
>> That sort of gets to your your rate and
your uh
>> Yeah. So, that I think the rate kind of
gets to that that point.
So let me um run through I guess you're
going to see similar a similar set of
slides here but for segments instead of
intersections and I think maybe we can
have more um discussion if there are
other thoughts.
Um so again we ran through the same four
calculations for segments instead of uh
intersections. This shows the top 50
just based on KSI total frequency.
Uh again with the the tiers where tier
one would be our highest priority uh
locations.
Um again you're seeing a concentration
in in you know southern Scottsdale with
with some segments up up north.
Option two again is the KSI rate. Uh
here we are accounting for both volume
and segment length in that calculation.
And again we're showing the top 50 here
in that tiered way again with a
concentration in in southern Scottsdale
for those segments.
And then option three, again, this is
the one where we're using a combination
of that uh EPDO type of method with the
the different weights for uh KA and then
BCO and then we're also incorporating
the KA crash rate into that. Um those
are the segments that you see here with
this calculation.
And finally, the monetary uh
calculation, the crash cost calculation.
If we rank our segments by that, um here
is the top 50 that you see in that in
that tiered way.
So
I guess to to continue our discussion we
were just just having a minute ago,
um these are the four options that that
we went through.
Um, we did like option three again
because of, you know, incorporating
those higher weights for K and A
crashes, but at the same time pulling in
crash rate to account for that um that
exposure uh for volume and length. Um,
but certainly up for discussion here.
Um, and I I think that's pro that was
probably the the end of of my part. So
happy to have more discussion or or
questions on this.
>> Are you looking for a vote of this board
as to which recommendation to follow
>> if we come up with a consensus? Yeah, I
would say a vote for which
recommendation with methology the board
would recommend would be
good.
>> Commissioner Penguids.
>> Um, so I trust the experts. I would be
okay with the recommendation.
Um I think I would really like to see a
safety plan where we have a bike injury
network and a pedestrian injury network
because a lot of these um crashes and
the counter measures that we can do are
going to be really different if we don't
separate those. I mean, yes, people are
are getting killed and maybe at certain
places, segments or intersections is
going to be a combination of both, but
having a more granular understanding
uh to know where to put our funding
might be helpful. So, that that's just
my comment.
>> Commissioner Davis,
>> um and just a question for you, Nathan.
So, we've talked about um an option by
by I guess by intersection and then one
by segment. Are we picking a
recommendation for each of those or just
>> intersections or segments?
>> I guess from my personal feelings but I
would encourage us to keep the same
methodology for both segments and
intersection.
>> Okay. So, so we are developing two
different networks. Well, I would hope
the same methodology, but yeah, there's
one for segments and there's one for
>> Yeah. So, so take taking all this in.
Um, I do like option three, but with the
um I guess the suggestion that um
Commissioner Woxin mentioned of of of
adding I don't know if it's a top five
or top 10% low volume
um segments or intersections get get
thrown out because I I don't want us to
focus on our efforts on something that
is just, you know, one crash happened
and they get 3,000 cars a day. that's
easily achieved and I like that
recommendation as well.
>> Vice chair.
>> Um, yes, I I also do trust the experts
and I do appreciate the work that went
into this. But I guess the question is
what do we want this manual, this
document to do and who do we want the
audience to be and I would strongly
recommend that we look for something
that is going to be more understandable
by people. And um and I know this again
from working with the city of Phoenix,
regardless of which method we use to
work uh look at the our crash networks,
every year the same article came out in
the newspaper, most top 10 most
dangerous intersections. And what they
were they were referring to was
frequencies, which you know, we gave
them frequencies, but um but
as annoying as that phrase was, um it
was the one time of the year where we
had an article where people were talking
about traffic safety and um you know,
looking at oh, you know, I understand
that I go through that intersection
every day and I understand what 10
crashes were or what 50 crashes I wish
we were 10 crashes, what you know what
50 crashes were. Um that's you know
almost one a week. Those kinds of
things. But they were they were things
that somebody reading it who is not in
this industry would be able to easily um
translate into
a message for them. You know that's 10
of my neighbors. that's, you know, five
one one crash every every every week or
one one crash every uh 10 days or
something like that. But it was easier
for people to take the information that
we provided and draw their own
conclusions for it. And I I just worry
that while I I agree that these are
there are probably better more academic
ways or more
um technical ways to look at the
information to communicate the message
of of this document. I think it's best
to have something that is more
understandable to
to regular people who who we want to
change behavior. And I I don't know that
seeing an HSM method on, you know, the
top intersections by HSM sends a message
to anyone other than, wow, city of
Scottsdale has some smart people working
for them. Um, I don't know that that
necessarily gets what the message
across.
So th that that's my recommendation that
we we we look at we look at options one
and two, although those are uh they
they're less meaningful uh
mathematically.
So,
I understand the the need to convey um
through media what the top 10 most
dangerous means. Um and I
>> just just don't use that word.
>> Right. Right. I like Yeah,
>> there are no dangerous intersections.
>> I I get the the flaw to the the
clickbait, right? That's that's where we
we fall into the trap regardless of what
high injury network option that we're
going with. So my recommendation would
be let's try to have the most
technically adapted to to meet your
values of what you want out of the
engineers for the high injury network
with the additional
um point that we can take and say what
communication guides do we have to offer
the media so that they're able to frame
this in a more eloquent
fashion, a more accurate fashion. Um,
and you know, it can be easier for them
to pick up and run with and know that
they're using
information that we we back up, you
know, with real data, with real uh
statistics, with real evidence and
research. Um, that doesn't become so
clickbaity or or misleading. Um, it's
part of like the communication and the
the people uh and educational elements
of of what this document ultimately can
do without it necessarily having the the
high injury network um take on that uh
burden.
>> I understand.
>> Okay. I'm just looking for skepticism or
or optimism in terms of the direction
that I'm putting out there for uh for
you to consider.
>> Commissioner Kofto,
>> um I just want to echo what Commissioner
Cardella said about option four, at
least having the monetary cost. I think
whichever one you end up going with, I
think having uh some sort of extra part
there saying this intersection has a
yearly cost of blah blah blah, you know,
would would be helpful to kind of
understand. And then when we see
something like, oh, it's going to cost
$10 million to redign this intersection,
we can point to, you know, there is a
annual cost uh to crashes in this
intersection of this amount of money.
And then the $10 million doesn't seem
like such a terrible s such a waste uh
or such an example of government
overspend or something like that. And
so, um, because I I I think I I
personally I I like data. I like number
three best. Uh, but I found, uh, Vice
Chair Will Coxin's arguments to be very
persuasive. So, but I would still want
there to be because I think that would
also be if we're thinking about a media
narrative and something people can
understand, uh, the lay person would
really feel on a visceral level. I think
having the cost of that intersection and
the way it's designed uh would would
help drive that point home as well.
So my uh commitment to this plan would
be that the economics would be embedded
in the recommendations of the the tiered
system, the list that we would provide
that would also help the grant the grant
pursuits that the city would follow up
with out of this plan to help inform
their cost benefit analysis. So we would
definitely um help quantify some of the
the economic uh impacts as ADOT
estimates them uh regardless of the high
injury network and I think that that
would uh in help inform the media
narrative as well
>> commissioners. So, I guess and it
doesn't really answer the question that
we want to answer here, but um in
response to our commissioner's comments,
it seems like we're looking maybe for a
layman's explanation of the method
within the plan and maybe an appendex
that explains uh that for someone that
really wants to dig deeper into it. So
something that the media can find
quickly and then when they look at the
other thing but they have a deadline of
5 pm it's just too much to explain. So
they just go for your plan explanation.
And then in terms of the cost um I do I
I thought these were societal costs. So
it's not necessarily costs that are
completely uh
by the city of Scottsdale.
Um so I don't know that we can make that
comparison uh in those terms but
certainly we find a way to to put a
monetary value on on life. So um it it
is worth mentioning that.
>> Yeah, thank you. You're right. Those are
those are societal
cost of crashes by severity. Yeah.
>> Commissioner Cardella, thank you. I am
in support of three as well. And I do
think that kind of indirectly takes into
account that monetary cost in the sense
that it does include those smaller
accidents that those are not causing
injury but that is causing significant,
you know, monetary damage. And I think
that not including those could risk, you
know, missing an intersection that is
maybe known for fender benders that
people are used to seeing small
accidents regularly but has never really
had a serious accident. But people, you
know, just knowing that this is a
problematic area. So, I think that that
um
the the more complicated definition is
is worth the the difficulty in having to
explain it.
And I I'll say that I agree with
recommendation number three as well.
Well, I I understand vice chair the uh
the
irritation of seeing
um
data simplified quite like that. Um I
don't think that any early
materials education is going to stop
that from a year from now the latest and
greatest reporter who's going to you
know that's sort of like the standard
beat because he who has all the uh the
uh accidents. Um, but I think that it's
important that this plan
be more than just what's going to be in
the newspapers. Um, and that there's a a
real um
basis behind all the numbers and behind
which um intersections we are going to
focus on.
And with that, I'm not sure we have a
cons. Oh,
>> sorry. Commissioner Marman.
>> Yeah. Thank you. I just want to mention
I concur with my fellow commissioners
that recommendation three is the way to
go with a clear explanation.
>> Is that I I wasn't quite sure that that
was what I was hearing
from the commissioners. There was a do
we have a consensus?
>> I think we have
consensus.
>> Okay.
So I Yes. I do not hear a consensus. Um,
Mr. Dome, would you like us to go to a
vote?
>> If if the group does not want to go to a
vote, we don't need to go to a vote.
It's possible action. So, we can we can
have a vote if somebody feels strongly
about it and then see how that vote
goes. Otherwise, we can we can reconvene
with the consultants and come up with um
a methodology based on the conversation
we just had about simplifying as well as
as making it more user friendly.
Well, in that case, I'll put it to the
commission. Would anybody like to make a
motion on a recommendation at this
point?
Hearing none, I guess we will ask you to
come back to us with a bit more
information uh taking into consideration
the discussion we just had. That sounds
perfectly fair and I think we're
perfectly capable of hearing the
different perspectives and finding a
win-win situation. One that ensures that
our crash rates don't uh negatively
affect on such low volume roads that we
can find ways to peel that out of our
analysis. We can find ways to elevate
pedestrian and bicycle uh crash networks
and vulnerable uh road user networks as
well. um as a an amended amendment to
this uh exercise. Uh a commitment to no
matter what methodology we we land on to
come away with the societal cost factors
uh of the the list so that you're able
to make an informed decision based on
the ranking to see it in those multiple
ways. So uh I hear you and that's our
commitment. Let's come back.
>> Thank you Mr. Wnjak. Dr. Russo, thank
you so much for being with us. Thank you
for the work on this project to date. Uh
thank you in advance for the work you're
going to and I really appreciate the
commission's um information and
discussion uh as we move forward.
>> We do have one more slide at the end of
this just to let you know what will be
coming to the September meeting. So
Greg's going to pull it back up. Sorry
about that.
There we go.
So, just letting you all know at the
September 18th meeting, we plan to bring
the education, enforcement, and
emergency responders item. We had kind
of shuffled these around and just um
want to go into more detail on those and
build off what we're already doing well
and see what we can improve. Thank you.
>> Thank you. Thank you so much.
>> Next item on the agenda is the 2025
transportation commission meeting uh
schedule. uh one we had set the schedule
for the year. We had planned nine
meetings uh to take off uh to have the
meeting in June, take off October,
take off in in December, one earlier in
the year, I forget which one. Um did not
realize in January that our June meeting
would actually be scheduled on a
holiday. So that was canceled. So in
order to uh
keep with nine meetings per year
uh we will need to add another meeting.
Would you like to
>> talk about that?
>> Yes. Thank you, Chair Miller. So, as as
you just stated, we did not know um that
that original schedule that everyone
approved would need to change. So, we
will need to have the October meeting
that to keep us at nine meetings for
2025, but we need since formal action
was already taken, we need to revise
that and take action tonight. So, we'd
be looking for a motion to
schedule the October meeting in place of
the June meeting that was cancelled.
>> Is there a motion to meet in October?
>> I make a motion to have a meeting in
October in place of the June meeting.
>> Second.
>> I'm sorry. Who was the second?
>> Lee.
>> Thank you.
>> Okay, let me just get that really quick.
Okay, I'll take a roll call vote. Chair
Miller,
>> yes.
>> Thank you. Vice Chair Wil Coxin,
>> yes.
>> Thank you. Commissioner Marman,
>> yes.
>> Thank you. Commissioner Pankerowitz,
>> yes.
>> Thank you, Commissioner Kofile.
>> Yes.
>> Thank you. Commissioner Cardella.
>> Yes.
>> Thank you. And Commissioner Davis.
>> Yes.
>> Thank you. So, as a reminder, there will
be an October meeting, but we will
continue to keep the December meeting
cancelled.
Thank you.
>> Thank you so much. With that, the last
item on the agenda is uh projects and
programs update.
Thank you. uh transportation commission.
Uh tonight we're going to do for
projects and programs a um
preview of what we need to present in
front of city council on the September
30th meeting. So every commission and
board has been going in front of council
and giving a summary of what they've
been working on. Ours is slated for
September 30th. So, we put together a
draft of the the standard template that
we've been provided of of our commission
looking to get uh impact uh feedback
from the commission on whether this is
going in the right direction or if they
wanted to if you want to include
anything else. Uh up on the podium right
now is is
a list of the major topic discussions
and actions taken for the past four
years that can be included in this
presentation looking to summarize and
and give a a comprehensive look at what
this commission has been doing for
council.
So starting with
uh board purpose and makeup, we want we
need to present what the board's makeup
and and purpose is. So for us, a little
unique in terms of us having a
commission and a subcommittee. So
showing that the commission was created
in 1988 and has seven members as well as
the passenger trail subcommittee was
created in 29 and consists of five
members appointed by city council. So
then it goes into the description as to
what the commission is supposed to
advise on. So advise city council on
matters related to the safe and
efficient movement of motor vehicles,
public transportation which includes but
is not limited to pedestrians, bicycles,
equestrians user trail users upon
designated paths and trails, streets and
all elements of the transportation
network.
to also go over the transportation
master plan and the capital improvement
program as well as the operating budgets
of transportation
and then also to provide a public forum
for citizen comments and requests.
So then we'll go into the key
accomplishments here. We've put in the
transportation action plan
implementation
uh review of transportation capital
projects including Jack Rabbit Miller
Miller pedestrian crossing the 124th SHA
underpass and the Miller Bridge and
Rawhide Wash control project as well as
several of the neighborhood traffic
management program exemption approvals
that that program every time there is a
request for an exemption from what our
traffic team has determined it'll go in
front of this body. So, three in the
last two years, a vital uh action taken
by this board is what we thought that
that would be uh a good summary of of
some of the key uh actions this body
takes. Then upcoming opportunities,
challenges or outcomes. So, the
transportation safety plan obviously one
of the new one of our uh reoccurring
discussion points that we will be
talking about for the upcoming duration
of this year and into next year. the
local area infrastructure plan update
which we discussed earlier this year and
will be coming to this body more
frequently as we get that underway. And
then once again the neighborhood traffic
management program exception approval
reviews that will be coming on as a
regular basis when there is a petition
for that. So a reoccurring thing. So
those were
examples we thought provided a good
insight again about where we're going to
be going in the future. So, and that is
the extent of what we're supposed to
present and I'll open up for any
comments on either the the uh document
in front of you or if anything off the
top of your head of should be included
in the discussion with council on
September 30th.
>> Vice Chair Wilson.
>> Uh thank you, Chair Miller. Um, Nathan,
these things have started already
and um the other commissions, the other
committees have been reporting out. Um,
are there generally questions from the
council and if so, what nature are those
questions? I mean, what are they looking
for from the other
um other commissions or is there a
theme?
>> Thank you, Chair Miller and Vice Chair
Will Coxin. Um, from what I've I think
it's pretty unique to whichever board
and commission is up there that the what
the questions are based on. So, I think
council's doing their due diligence on
what they want to ask each individual
one. So, the theme I think it's ranged
from pretty benign questions, pretty
calm and not a whole lot of conversation
to a pretty extensive conversation. So,
I I don't know if we can garner what
we'll uh get from what the other boards
and commissions have gotten.
>> Okay. And then a follow-up question then
based on what you know from just um
conversations you've had in your daytime
job. Um
do these topics that you're recommending
that we cover? Do these kind of cover
the areas of interest that you know you
get questions about or are there areas
that
um aren't covered that you typically get
questions about?
>> I think the most questions are about the
transportation action plan. So, I don't
think we're hiding away from what the
questions are going to mostly be about.
>> Okay.
>> As well as the the capital projects. So,
having those two up there, those will be
the majority of the questions.
>> Thank you,
>> Commissioner Cardella. Thank you. It
didn't seem like it highlighted any or
any projects that the trail subcommittee
looked at. So maybe if you could add a
point, maybe I missed that, but in terms
of the what they've been covering and
maybe just a little tidbit on the
expansion of trails and some
quantitative measure of how much that
that's work's been done there.
>> No, thank you, Commissioner Cordella.
You're right. Uh this is focused the the
next slides are focused primarily on the
transportation commission. So we'll
incorporate some some components of what
the path trails has been up to.
>> Great. And then that past slide there
was a typo. So where it spells out seven
on the second one it's supposed to say
five. I think
>> you're right. We will fix that before
September 30th.
>> Good eye. Barely
>> a lot of words. Thank you.
>> Good suggestion. Thank you.
>> That's it. Any any other suggestions,
comments?
>> Um
Commissioner Kafa,
>> sorry.
So,
I think I I don't I've I've never gone
in front or been present for one of
these, I believe. Um
there's a lot offormational
accomplishments on here, which I think
would be which could be framed as
I I just don't know if it'd be
appropriate. I guess I guess what I'm
saying is like the thing that I'm proud
of is uh that that I think that we've
done is direct the city's priorities in
gathering these information. you know,
like the path and trails network gap
analysis is I think that's an important
thing to help determine where the city
is going to be building the the path
counters uh so that we have an idea of
actually how and when and where people
are using uh our system. you know, the
uh
the the tap the trans uh changes. Uh I I
don't think I was there for those, but
um I think that sounds like some pretty
important stuff. And then I've seen the
pathways wayfinding signage evolve over
time. And I think that's another really
important thing that the this department
that this commission has done to improve
uh the experience of people using uh our
uh our things. So, I don't know if it's
appropriate or how how it would be
framed, but I would like to say, you
know, like, you know, just there's been
a lot of guidance towards how the city
um has done the work that that that they
do to continue to make uh this one of
the the west most western town or Yeah.
So, excellence simply delivered all all
the other things that that we say about
Scottsdale and that makes it a great
place to live. So, um I I don't know how
you would want to do that. I I guess
that that's just trying to make your
life more complicated.
>> No, no. I think thank you for the
comment, uh, Commissioner Cottel. Um,
the the pamphlet in front of you that's
for this commission. This won't be
presented. So, if you're worried about
showing all the informationational
stuff, I certainly would say my answer
to that is just because it's
informationational doesn't mean we're
not pro you guys aren't providing
feedback to us. We're not taking our
notes and incorporating that feedback
into everything that we do. So, um, if
that gets brought up that we have too
manyformational items, I would most
likely go down that line to say that
just because it'sformational doesn't
mean that we're not having an open
discussion and and directing how uh,
staff goes about listening to the
residents as well as as the commission
on ways to improve our policies and
projects.
>> Thank you.
>> Anything else?
Great. I think you've got comments and
uh anything else that you would like to
bring up, Mr. Jay?
>> No. Uh we'll incorporate those comments
and uh start getting ready for September
30th.
>> Thank you.
And with that, I think that we're ready
for a motion to adjourn.
>> I make I move that we adjourn this
meeting.
Second
>> motion by Vice Chair Wil Coxson, second
by Commissioner Davis that we adjourn
the
August, what day is today? 21st meeting?
Don't know what day it is. Um, all those
in favor say I.
>> I.
>> I.
>> Opposed.
The eyes have it. And I think we are
done. Thank you staff. Thank you
commissioners. I know our meeting is a
little longer than normal. really
appreciate all of your all of your
comments. Thank you.
>> Thank you.