Okay, so we will call the Bloomington MPO meeting to order on this October 23rd, 2026. Can you hear
me now? So we will begin with introductions and we'll start to my left. Steve Bishop, City of Bloomington
Playing Commission.
Hopi Stossberg, City of Bloomington Common Council. Andrew Seabor, serving as proxy for Mayor Thompson.
Lisa Ridge, Monroe County Highway Department. Doug Horn, Bloomington Public Transit Corporation Board
of Directors. Scott Ferris, Monroe County Plan Commission. Sam Tobin-Hockstad, Citizens Advisory Committee.
Nate Nichols, City of Bloomington Public Works Department, proxy for Adam Wason, Public Works Director.
And it looks like we have two online. Becky, if you want to go first. Becky Packer, Indiana Department
of Transportation. I'm Julie Thomas, Monroe County Commissioner. Thank you. Item two, approval of the
agenda for October 23rd, 2026.
I'll move that we approve the agenda as presented. Second. We have a motion and we have a second. Any
discussion? Any public comment? Seeing none, roll call vote please.
Yes. Ridge. Yes. Horn. Can't hear you. Horn. Yes. Ferris. Yes. Bishop. Yes. Stasberg. Yes. Seaborg.
Yes. Nichol. Yes. Are they visible while we saw them? Packer.
Yes. And Thomas? Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. Moving on to item three, approval of the minutes from
August 28th, 2026. We have a motion. Hopi? I'll move that we approve the minutes from August 28th, 2026
as presented. Second. We have a motion. We have a second. Any discussion?
Any public comment? Seeing none, roll call vote please. Packer? Yes. Thomas? Yes. Bishop? Yes. Ferris?
Yes. Horne? Yes. Ridge? Yes. Seaborg? Yes. Tobin-Hashta? Yes. Nichol? Yes. Motion passes.
I'm a yes too. Stossberg. Thank you. Yes. Motion passes. Communications from chair or vice chair.
I have none. Okay. Communications from officers and or committees. So the citizens advisory committee
met on Wednesday and we approved the schedule and we
heard discussion of the upcoming tip that we will hear today. The TAC met this past Wednesday and also
had an opportunity to review the tip and have some discussion. I know the topic of e-bikes came up a
little bit and also approved the meeting schedule for next year. Thanks. Thank you. Reports from staff.
Okay, the first item we have is City of Bloomington press release, dated October 14th, 2026. This is
a temporary one-way traffic pattern, westbound only for West 2nd Street beginning on October
27th. Anticipated to extend to November 25th. Might note that West Street will begin, I'm sorry, that
West 2nd Street will be westbound only, but 1st Street will be eastbound only. And this is only a temporary situation
due to the construction on 2nd Street where they are laying full-depth asphalt. And that date of extending
November 25th is what I would call, in case of bad weather, probably be finished prior to that. I'll
be happy to answer any questions anybody may have. Okay. Next item, October 8th, 2026 letter from NDOT.
for TIP project number does number 2101712. This is the Dillon Road Bridge number 83 replacement in
Monroe County, west of 3000 feet, west of 037. The letter essentially says that there is a historic
significance to the structure itself. It should be saved in some way or another be put on the adopt
a bridge program. And that's,
In a nutshell, that's exactly what the letter says. You can read the letter in its fullness if you want
to. Does anybody have any questions on that? Okay, next item. October 8th, 2026 letter from the Indiana
Department of Natural Resources for Transportation Improvement Program, DES number 2401216.
This is the existing pedestrian bridge over the State Road 45-46 bypass just east of Interstate 69.
This is an extensive evaluation of the structure in terms of its historical significance. The recommendations
are to relocate, well, dismantle and relocate the structure to another location, put it into the adopt
a bridge program.
I'm not sure how they would do the adopt a bridge program for something like this. It would probably
be best to be put into some sort of a park, a city park or a county park somewhere in the state of Indiana.
But again, that's a very extensive letter goes into the detail about the historical significance of
the structure itself. It's the only one. It's a one of one, I believe, in the state of Indiana. Be happy
to answer any questions you may have on that one.
Thank you. I guess on both of these, like what kind of effect does that have on us as an MPO or, cause
at least with that Kinzer one, that pedestrian bridge, right? That's the one that we're talking about
here. Yeah. And I mean, in dot that's an in dot plan to redo that bridge. So is there like a fiscal
impact? Is there, do we just have to, you know, think of places where this bridge could go? Like,
or is this a required sort of recommendation, or is this just like a hint? Well, the realization is
the structure is inadequate, and it needs to be replaced. The question is, where do you replace it at?
And the initial discussions were that you construct a new structure closer to Kinzer and Rogers,
move it, I don't know,
a couple thousand feet to the east or something like that. Then there's also, we had one citizen approach
us and suggested a tunnel underneath, though that's bedrock as far as I know, under there, so that would
be an issue. So I don't know where it's at right now, and NDOT is aware of the issue, the structure
needs to be replaced. The question is,
How would it be replaced? Where would it be replaced? When would it be replaced? How much would it cost?
And then you also have what's called connectivity. What's going to connect to? Where's the origin? Where's
the destination? Destination landing on the north side could be figured out pretty easily, but on the
east side, where do you land that at? I don't know.
So you have to have a logical termini, and that's where all of these variables are in play right now.
OK. But in terms of fiscal impact that we can determine right now or any kind of change in course, there's
not one? None. OK. And is that true with the Dillman Bridge situation, too, in terms of that? The Dillman
Road Bridge.
I mean, that's already programmed by the county. It's in preliminary engineering. I don't know if you're
doing right of way on that now. I think you've started right of way on that too, for that matter. That
one is moving right along for construction, for a contract letting in the near future. That one, it's
just a matter of taking the bridge apart, putting it somewhere. And the somewhere may be Limestone Greenway
Trail Park,
I think that's what Kelly Whitmer from Monroe County Parks had told us at the TAC meeting on Wednesday
was that would be the home, the new home, if not the possible home for that Dillman Road Bridge that
exists right now. The Dillman Road Bridge is a plank structure when you cross the deck. John Kennedy,
who's on the Citizens Advisory Committee, bicycle rider, he said he's lost a few tires.
in that bridge caught in between the joints there. And he said that he's even scared to walk on it too
with bicycle shoes. But other than that, it's safe for automobiles still at this point in time. OK,
but it's already in the process of being moved and we've figured out where it's going to go to. So there's
also no consequence really to that either because all of those plans were already
Okay, great, thanks. Yeah. Doug? Yeah, Pat, just the point of interest. The current pedestrian bridge
that we talked about shortly ago, does that meet current ADA requirements? I don't know. You know, I
remember when that thing went up. I think I was driving. I'm not sure. But I didn't...
You know, ADA may not have been as or what it is today when that thing went in. Katie says she thinks
not. I don't know because I don't familiarize myself with state structures, whether they're ADA compliant
or not. Sure, sure. But that's a question we can ask. We can give you an answer at our next meeting.
Oh, just of interest. If they're going to use it somewhere else, that might turn into an issue.
Yes, and I, yeah, if they place it somewhere else, the approach ramps would have to be redone. Yeah,
that arch to me, I keep thinking, is that one foot, you know, one inch per foot on that? I don't know
about that. What is it, one to eight or something like that? Yeah, I don't know. I think the letter
actually says that it doesn't meet accessibility guidelines.
I did not read the letter, so thank you. I read it and it didn't stick. Thank you. Okay, the last item
we've got for staff report is the recent updates to the MPO transportation improvement program. This
is the current program, the 26 through 30, yeah, 26 through 30 transportation improvement program with
locations on a virtual map.
If you click that link, it'll lead you to a GIS map, ArcGIS map, which shows you where the current projects
are and also identifies certain criteria associated with those projects too. Those are all updated on
a continuous basis. Question? We have a quarterly tracking meeting with the LPAs in a couple weeks,
so we'll have some
more updates on how the current projects are going next meeting. Any questions, anybody? Okay. All right.
Moving on, we have no old business listed. Item eight, new business. First review of the calendar year
2027 committee meeting schedule.
Yeah, and I would call this a first review. Normally, we give this to you in December, and then we also
give it to the committees in January as a reinforcing mechanism. This identifies everything here. I
think we've got one conflict, well, one potential conflict, May 28, I believe. That's not a conflict,
but it is a Friday before a Monday holiday.
We could change that now or we could change it the month before. Go ahead, Pat. Sorry. Or we can change
it in December. It's just the awareness of the fact that that's the Friday before Memorial Day weekend.
And attendance on May 28th may be slim to none because everybody wants Saturday, Sunday, and Monday off.
So if we're setting this in our calendar, may we strike through that date and just expect a different
one? Yeah. I mean, we could postpone it till we talked about postponing it to a week later. That would
put you into June for the policy committee. And normally June is the recess month for the policy committee
itself. So the choices are we can postpone it to a week later.
or we can cancel the meeting altogether, one of the two. That's a decision made by the policy committee
itself on what they want to do. And that doesn't have to be made today. This is just an awareness factor
for you. So that way, if you didn't want to make a decision today, we could do this on, do this in December
when we meet on December 4th.
April 2nd. April 2nd. Didn't we do something different in the past for December or January
due to appointments on the board or not meet in January? In previous years, two years ago, the policy
committee used to meet on the second Friday of the month. And the TAC and the CAC would meet on the
fourth. We combined that.
this year, so that way everybody meets on the same week. That way you get a sequential process instead
of a bifurcated process. You get sequential decision making on Wednesday, Wednesday, and then Friday.
So that's how we came to a single week. Always the fourth Wednesday of the month is the fourth Friday
of the month. Makes it a lot easier on everybody meeting the schedules. Makes it easier in terms of
decision making also for that
Also note that April, the March meeting has been moved forward a week to April due to that Friday being
a holiday. March 26th is a holiday. It's generically known as spring holiday. And is that still the
1030 meeting time? Is that still? Yes, all the meeting times would remain the same. Okay.
mean myself I would say not change anything for May at this point just because it's so far out there
and then you're gonna have two meetings in April so there could be a chance you could cancel that meeting
yes that's just my opinion yes yeah we will we will I promise no unnecessary meetings I mean we try
to be cognizant of your time in terms of coming to attend all the meetings and making decisions going
through the
luminous packets. I guess a question is the staff have a recommendation it sounds like our options are
to just approve what is presented knowing we could change it it is or to delay a vote until our next
meeting or to strike the like I'm just curious for for your recommendation on this agenda.
I, sorry, when I updated the 8.1 yesterday, I changed it to first review of the calendar, but I forgot
to remove the motion in second language, so sorry about that. That's confusing. So you do not have to
vote today. We'll ask you to approve it at the December meeting. Thank you. Yeah, the technical advisory
committee did not vote on it. The citizens advisory committee did vote on it.
Yeah, it's up to your option on what course of action you wish to choose. Is there a reason not to vote
on it? Another December is always better. I mean, it's closer. Closer to the time frame, yeah. Call
this version 1.0. If we wait until our next meeting, what will happen between now and our next meeting?
Nothing. There might be more people at the December meeting. So there might be a few more voices that
have an opinion about something, but. Yeah, we may have more people in December because that's the adoption
proposed adoption of the transportation improvement program. All right, so we'll move on to first review
of the draft
Bloomington Monroe County MPO fiscal year 2028-2032 transportation improvement program. Okay the program
which we have put together here and we've published we published this on well the first of all let me
go back the last updated version is October 1st this is what's posted on the website
We opened the public comment period after legal advertisements in the Herald Times, two legal advertisements
in the Herald Times on a Friday edition and also on a Sunday edition prior to a week before the public
meeting. October 1st was published date. October 2nd was the beginning of the 30-day public comment
period. 30-day public comment period extends till November 1st.
November 1st is on a Sunday. And originally, I told somebody 5 o'clock on Sunday, and the answer is
really 12 o'clock midnight on Sunday the 1st. So if you want to be up at 1159 making comments, you can
do that. We are accepting all comments in a written form, electronic form, postal. We had a letter yesterday,
first letter in a long time, but we had a letter yesterday on comments.
We also advertised an open house on the transportation improvement program that was held on the 12th.
Yeah, thank you, 12th. Sorry if I've got all the dates here. On October 12th, we had one person attend.
That individual was there for approximately an hour and a half. So hopefully I answered a lot of questions,
but then we also received formal comments.
from that individual in electronic form via an email and we also received comments via paper on a letter.
Again, if you've got any comments or questions on the transportation improvement program or your friends
and neighbors do, we encourage you to send those in. Again, public comment period is open until the
first. Now scrolling down on the program of projects,
down here on page 13. Page 13, this is our projected federal highway formula funds for fiscal year 28,
29, 30, 31, 32. Notice we say estimate on the first two years. And the reason we say estimate is because
the current
Surface Transportation Bill, the Infrastructure and Investment Jobs Act. The bill is under a continuing
resolution in Congress. It's under its third, I believe, third continuing resolution. So these are estimates
given to us by the Indiana Department of Transportation. We don't come up with these ourselves. So the
carbon reduction program, the highway safety improvement program, the PROTECT program, which is Environmental
Section 164, which is penalty money for those
Well, for the states that aren't meeting standards, air quality standards, we get that funding. Surface
transportation block grant, which is always the biggest amount of money that we receive. Surface
transportation block grant, TIFIA. Transportation alternatives, which is the alternative transportation.
And then transportation alternatives, TIFIA. And then the anticipated spending authority is 4.5 million.
a little above 4.5 million. Now, those of you that are keenly aware, in prior years, we were in the
vicinity of more like 5.5, $5.2 million. We're down a million dollars. The reason for that is because
of the 2020 census. The 2020 census, we had 45,000 students who went home on March 15th. The census
came in and counted the urban area in April 1st,
And the allocation of funding to our MPO is based on per capita allocation. So as a result of losing
the population, losing the population, meaning they went home and they weren't counted, because of that
loss, we lost funding vis-a-vis the balance of the state of Indiana, which grew slightly. So that's
our penalty right there. So we've flatlined those numbers.
all the way across simply because that's the easiest way to estimate at this point in time. And then
stay tuned in January when Congress, new Congress comes in, it depends how that election goes in terms
of reauthorization of the Service Transportation Act. The next page we've got here on page 14 shows us the
The highway, federal highway formula funds by local, yeah, local public agency, city of Bloomington,
14 million. Monroe County, 5.4 million. Anticipated spending authority is 19.7 million. Somebody asked
on Wednesday, why is this split? And it's based on the ask. We don't determine that.
It's based on the requests, the project requests that come in. Some years it's one entity has more money
than the other. In other years, it's another entity has more money. This is what the split is for this
current proposed transportation improvement program. And if you look at it in terms of local funds used
for transportation improvement projects sponsored by the local public agencies, you'll see what the
split is there. For 28, fiscal year, these are,
federal fiscal year, by the way, starting July 1st. Federal fiscal year 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, and then
the total amounts shown out there. Total amount is $13.5 million. If you go to the next table, which
is on page 15, fiscal constraint. We are required by law, by federal law, to have fiscal constraint
for all of our projects. In other words, we can't spend more money than what's actually programmed.
We can spend the money in terms of you losing local dollars, but we can't overspend on federal funding
dollars. So our anticipated spending authority is at the top line there for fiscal year 28, 29, 30,
31, and 32. Existing funding exchange agreements are shown there. These exchange agreements were done
for three projects in prior years.
Total available funding available for the MPOs and this is showing for each individual fiscal year.
And then showing under that is each individual project that is proposed for the new transportation
improvement program, college and Walnut corridor, crosswalk safety improvements phase three, crosswalk
safety improvements phase four, downtown curb ramps phase five,
Old State Road 37 and Dillman Road safety project North Dunn Street multi-use path. North Walnut Street
improvements phase one. North Walnut Street improvements phase two. Sidewalk and ADA ramp repair replacement
project and this is in Monroe County within the urbanized area and outside of the boundaries of the
city of Bloomington. So the total obligations there are totaled up at the bottom and then shows
percentage of obligation, there's not a penny left on the table. We'll be using all of our dollars.
And then the next, on page 16, we're showing the funding tables by individual program, category years,
and how much they're obligated by. I'm not gonna go into the details on this, but you can see that we're
balancing everything out to zero, zero, zero, and zero.
Then if you go to page 18 on the Federal Transit Administration funds, these are separate than the highway
funds in the sense that they are allocated based on formulas, formulas for Bloomington Transit based
on its size, based on number of passengers, based on passenger trip miles and a number of other variables
that are in there. So the 5307, which is there,
Operating assistance, we're looking at the funding there across the years. FTA 5310, look at the funding
there, 5311, 5339. Total funding for rural transit is down here also. We recommended to rural transit
that their needs for fiscal year 28, that they add a 4% inflation factor
to all of the years that are out there in the outline years, which they did. Total federal funding for
Bloomington Transit, you can see that down there, 5.2 million beginning fiscal year 28 and 5.5 million
out in fiscal year 32. Total federal funding down there, big numbers, 6 million, 6 million essentially
all the way across, except for one year fiscal year 30 at 9 million. And then state funding, this is the,
Public Mass Transportation Fund. And this is the allocation which would come to Bloomington Transit
and to Rural Transit for their operations. Doug, I don't know if you want to add anything to this at
all on the transit purview. This all ignores the capital construction of the new administration maintenance
operations building on Curry Pike.
Yeah, we've seen some of these numbers. Part of the downward trend in this is related to, I believe,
some historical ridership levels. And we're working steadfastly with a new management company to right
that ship. And we look forward to different numbers.
Yeah, Bloomington Transit ridership is facing a number of challenges in that there are a number of other
multimodal opportunities. Number one, Bloomington Transit riders could use, if they're students, they
could use IU campus bus instead of Bloomington Transit. Number two, there are scooters. Number three,
there are e-bikes. Number four, we've increased the number of
multimodal pathways within the city of Bloomington. Number four, walking, good old-fashioned walking,
and that's up also. And then there are the drivers that are out there, but the campus itself is really
the driver around that center. And then what Bloomington Transit is focused on is what I would call
the non-rider or the non-traditional rider.
people who normally would not ride the bus, but would be brought in at a convenience factor. And that's
being done in a number of ways with paratransit. It's also being done with microtransit and
the experimentation of that. Also the partnerships with Uber and Lyft for after hours. A number of ways
are out there to increase the ridership. It's up to the consumer which modal choice they wish to make.
when they make the modal choice of public transportation, is it campus bus or is it Bloomington Transit?
Yeah, I couldn't have said it better myself, Pat. Thank you. A couple of other things. The battery electric
buses have a certain height requirement, which has limited the traditional routes that have served parts of
Eastern campus. We're also going to be doing a route optimization study under our new general management
company. One has not been done for some time and we hope to
to bring our routes more in line with consumer demand and at a far greater and more reliable frequency.
These are things that have been identified in a very short period of time under a new manager. We'll
continue to expand those and we're looking very positively at the future. These numbers are motivational.
You know, another observation, too, is that on-time performance has always been good for Bloomington
Transit. The challenge for Bloomington Transit is finding enough drivers. There's been a shortage of
drivers ever since the 2020 COVID. Well, yeah, since COVID shut down in 2020, there's been a shortage
of drivers and how to attract them and how to keep them has always been a big challenge. Well, it's
a very high standard.
It is a standard that is ignored by Uber and Lyft. And the hours are taxing and to provide service to
the community. But I will say that our driver base has a tremendous level of morale and
dedication to meeting the call to serve. So they're a unique, wonderful group, and it's hard to add
to them. But yes, we're down, I believe, nine drivers at this point in time where we'd like to be comfortably
to manage the system and be prepared for bips and bobbles that always hit you with weather and other issues.
Yeah, thanks for the time. One last thing I want to point out is that I think the Bloomington Transit's
fleet is 40% or 45% electric buses now. That's an achievement that they've gotten in the last four to
five years. That's cut the cost substantially in terms of fuel, in terms of maintenance, in terms of
wear and tear. And then also the delivery of the two new articulated buses
full length articulated buses in recent months too. I've seen those constantly and they've always been
full. Don't you feel like a bigger city with those things wobbling around? I just think they're cool.
Yeah, we'll have more of those. And I believe, I think I heard that the university may be adding one
or two as well. Because there are certain routes that require
that level of service on a regular basis. If you've got 60 people wanting to get on a 40-person bus,
it's hard to sell that product. But it also takes almost two years once an order is placed for the bus
to arrive.
Things are changing electrically, of course. You know, you can't buy an electric bus today, new one.
And parts are non-existent. In fact, they are done with 3D printers quite a bit now when they're needed.
Luckily, electrical formats are fairly maintenance-free and do not require a lot of that type of interaction.
Signs of the times. We are buying two hybrid buses here shortly, which is really about the best that
we can do environmentally at this point on produced units. But we'll continue to have that banner in
front of us of eliminating our carbon footprint.
Okay, and then moving on to page 21, which is the project list and map. Page 20, yeah, 21 actually ends
all the projects. And I'm not gonna go through all of these. These are the projects requested for programming
by Monroe County, City of Bloomington, Indiana Department of Transportation, Rural Transit,
Bloomington Transit. I might note, as I noted before the meeting, the project sponsored by the Department
of Transportation beginning on page 29, this list of projects is set. The fiscal constraint has not
been achieved on any of the state projects at this point in time. So those amounts that are programmed
for each individual project may change slightly between now and December.
We submitted on October 13th, I believe I submitted the draft transportation improvement program for
review by the Indiana Department of Transportation, technical services staff, also by Federal Highway
Administration, Indiana Division and Federal Transit Administration's Division 5 office. They have 30
days to provide to us comments, review comments on the document.
As soon as we receive those comments, then we'll adjust the draft program into a final program, also
incorporating in all the public comments that we received during the public comment period. So what
you see now is, I don't know, 98 pages or so, and we may add another 12 to 20 pages, depending on what
happens between now and December. So any other questions anybody may have?
a lot to consume. Seeing no questions. Okay, moving on to public comment on non-voting matters not included
on the agenda.
Any communications from committee members on non-voting matters not included on the agenda?
Upcoming meetings, the technical advisory committee meeting will be December 2nd at 10 a.m. Citizens
advisory committee will be December 2nd at 530 p.m. And the next policy committee will be December 4th
at 1030 a.m. All the meetings are available hybrid.
We are adjourned.