The Bloomington Monroe County Metropolitan Planning Office Technical Advisory Committee meeting on Wednesday,
April 22nd 2026 I guess we'll start with a thanks everybody for being here as well as our attendees
online I guess we will start with introductions and maybe we'll start to my left Neil. Are you okay
with starting off? Neil copper proxy for the city of Bloomington City engineer Proxy David Hiddle
City Bloomington Public Works Department John Baton GIS coordinator Monroe County Jackie Jelen Monroe
County planning Hunter Jackson proxy for the Monroe County otter Kelly Whitmer Monroe County Parks and
Recreation Lynette Tavernier Monroe County Highway Department alternate for the highway engineer
Megan Blair, GIS Manager, City of Bloomington. Rebecca Swift, Operations and Development, Division Director,
Parks and Rec. Linnea Wellings, NDOT, proxy for Rebecca Packers.
And that was John Kennedy, who also introduced himself online. Thanks. I think we're good. Thanks, everybody.
Oh, sorry. Cheryl just joined. If you want to introduce yourself, Cheryl,
Maybe her sound's not working. Go ahead. That's all right. Cheryl, if you get the chance later, you
can introduce yourself. OK, so I guess that moves us to the approval of the agenda for 2026, or for
today's meeting on April 22. Can I get a motion for approval? So moved. Second. Thanks, Jane and Nate.
I believe that's who that was. Oh, it was Ryan. Sorry.
Jane and Ryan it's it's early. It's actually not early, but it feels early to me. So I guess would this
be a Have some votes now. Yeah copper. Yes Jackson Yes, Robling yes, Jelen. Yes, fleek. Yes Gilliland
Yes, can you hear me now? Yes Baten yes
Shelly, how do you say your last name? How do you say your last name? Stramitis. Yes. Kennedy is non-voting.
Whitmer. Yes. Blair. Yes. Wellings. Yes. Swift. Yes. Nickel. Yes. Motion passes. Great, thanks. And
that brings us to the approval of the past meeting minutes from February 25th, 2026.
Is there a motion to approve? So moves. Second. Thanks, Neil and Ryan. Wells. Swift, sorry. Yes. Wellings.
Yes. Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot you to have an ear the first time. Yes. Nickel. Yes.
Blair Yes, Whitmer. Yes stream on us Gilliland Gilliland Jellin Yes, flake. Yes, Robling. Yes Jackson.
Yes copper
Yes, that motion passes I'll go yes on that one as well. I'm sorry. I think it's okay, but just I'm
guessing we have we've got enough Yeses, but just for the land is yes as well. Sorry Okay, I guess that
brings us to any type of communication from the chair or vice chair I Don't have a ton of things Jane.
Do you have anything to bring up?
I guess the only thing I would mention is that it looks like our packets are new and so I was wondering
as we get to the communications from staff to talk about the kind of the change to the packets and things
like that if folks are interested and just kind of the formatting but Beyond that I guess we'll move
on to communications from officers and or committees I Guess hearing none the reports from MPO staff
And if I'm going too quickly through this, let me know if I'm, okay, thank you. I don't think he asked.
Did you wanna talk about the packets? Yeah, if you guys want to kind of like elucidate, I just noticed
that the format's a little bit different. They're smaller packets with links and stuff like that. The
one thing I noticed is that the areas where, which Nate was so fortunate to have, these bolded kind
of things that said,
Hey chair, this is when you have a vote that they're not bolded anymore. So if we could get those again,
that'd be sweet for me just for like the next couple the next couple meetings Each item that required
public comment, so that might be a nice item that kind of reinsert just to make sure we're minding our
P's and Q's Thanks for clarifying that Nate to the asterix, but yeah, good point. Thank you. Nice catch. I
The packets are slightly different due to the accessibility laws, which were supposed to be in effect
this coming Friday, but are now delayed for another year. So we will probably maintain this format.
It is challenging to make all packet items accessible, so we're still learning.
That's why this format because this format is a lot easier to make accessible to screen readers than
a PDF is so cool. Thanks Katie. That was really clarifying. And yeah we are in the county side as well
just like the city working towards that accessibility. So yeah it's a big kind of lift and hopefully
there'll be some more kind of guidance we get from either the federal or state level for us to kind
of move forward with that. Thanks.
I guess this just goes to the reports from the MPO staff. Okay Yeah, and the the agenda in the packets
they're a big lift Kudos Katie for doing all this. I would have struggled still First thing I want to
mention is public public hearing notice for three Bloomington Transit Public comment sessions. These
are proposed service improvements for route 16 on the west side the first
Public comment meeting is on Monday, May 4th from five to six o'clock at Ivy Tech State College, the
Lampkin Hall out on the Ivy Tech College campus. Second meeting is on Wednesday, May 6th from 12 to
one o'clock. It's at Bloomington Public Transit Corporation's Downtown Transit Center here on 301 West
South Walnut Street.
And then the third meeting is Thursday, May 7th from four to five o'clock for those that can't make
it during the noon hour. It's also at the Bloomington Public Transportation Corporation's downtown transit
center at 301 South Walnut. The overview is route 16 is essentially a combination of route, existing
routes three west and 13,
It's a 90 minute schedule from departure all around and arrival back to the downtown transit center.
This consolidation is taking place to hopefully boost ridership. And that's about all I have to say
other than that. Anybody have any questions? It's all there as a pop up in the packet straight from
Bloomington Public Transportation Corporation.
Okay, next item we have is speed limit to be reduced on C word 46 through Ellisville This is something
we brought we the staff brought to the attention of the Indiana Department of Transportation Even though
they were aware of it public news release on March 30th in that effective a reduction of the speed limit
became effective on Tuesday March 31st through Ellisville
School zone speed limit was reduced from 30 miles an hour to 25 miles an hour between 2nd Street and
Paul Street. Advanced school signs and flashers were installed to help emphasize the change. Reduced
speed is intended to enhance safety along the corridor. INDOT wants to remind everyone, and I'm sure
the town of Ellisville wants to remind everyone,
to slow down, use extra caution, and avoid distractions when driving. In other words, phone down,
head up. And all of that is taking place right now. Next thing we have is the AASHTO wear safety software.
Some of you may not be aware of what AASHTO is. AASHTO is the American Association of State Highway
Transportation Officials.
They have recently, recently as in the last few years, developed various software packages to help State
Department of Transportation's come to a common, what I would call a common usage of software. One of
the packages out there, it's called AASHTO, where safety software, the Indiana Department of Transportation,
has announced that they are adopting the software. The adoption will take place, well, in beta testing,
it'll take place over the summer and this fall. And then it goes into actual use January 1st. The software
package replaces a program, a software program called Road Hat, which was developed by Purdue University.
It was a custom software package
developed at least 10, maybe 12 years ago. And the HAT stands for Hazard Analysis Tool, not as in Purdue
Road HAT. But the new AASHTO safety software package looks at intersections, looks at segments. It takes
a very thorough deep dive into safety analysis and crash causal factors.
It will eventually have some sort of an AI type of module in it, which will help identify patterns,
particularly on segments. Like I said, this will take place on January 1st. We've volunteered, Katie
and I have volunteered to be beta testers for MPOs. Stay tuned, we'll let you know more as it comes about.
The next thing I have is the Indiana Department of Transportation has released a draft active transportation.
Oh, I'm sorry. I missed the in dot traffic count database system. Let me go back to that in dot traffic
count database system. These the MPO had paid for traffic count database software over the course of the last
nine years we had paid for it and the software wasn't used by the MPO staff it was used by the city
of Bloomington engineering department it was also available to Monroe county highway department if they
wanted to use it and also the town of Ellitsville we recently came upon an offer which was too good
to be true from the department of transportation
in that they offered to let us use their statewide license, software license that cut the cost for us
by about $2,500. $2,500 doesn't sound like much, but it is when you're an MPO. So we went through a
process with the engineering department staff where we uploaded all of the traffic count database system
Accounts 311 locations. We uploaded all that several weeks ago Linked it in to the Department
of Transportation's traffic count database system map So if you go into the TC DS map buy-in dot start
zooming in on Bloomington You'll see all of the traffic count locations pop up and all the different
details on whether that's one-way traffic two-way traffic and
Um, I don't know if it's showing design hourly volume or not, but it's showing all of the results of
all of the counts we've done over the system over the, over the last decade. Uh, this will be a permanent
process in that it costs us nothing. And it makes it easier for management too, because it's in a central
hard central location system with the department of transportation questions. Anybody?
Neil, anything to add? Yeah, I looked at this map yesterday and it was a little confusing because I
was trying to figure out what was going on with it. So that was, thanks for kind of giving the background
on it. In terms of the traffic counts, were those things I guess carried out or compiled by essentially
like the, those kind of sensors that are spread across roads and cars drive over them, et cetera?
These are all road tube counts. Road tube counts that are done by Mike Stewart and one of the other
staff members of the engineering department. It's nitty gritty dirty work and dangerous too at the same
time. Yeah, we're not using flock cameras. We're not using anything recording license plates or anything
like that. It's just pure road tube. And they do directional counts.
design hourly volumes, you get your average ADT out of all of that, and we use that for, well, they
use it for engineering decisions. We also use it for looking at crash data, looking at crash data so
that way we can look at crash factors and determine what the frequency is for certain types of crashes,
particularly fatal and serious injury crashes. Does that answer your question?
Yeah, I was just kind of curious about that the methodology to the background of it Yeah, and it's the
fact that this is free. It's great. So yeah, let's keep using it The price is right free. Yeah Okay,
the next item I'll go back to now is the Indiana Department of Transportation draft active transportation
report This is a draft plan which is out on the website still I checked this morning just to make sure
it's there because sometimes it's there one day and gone the next But it's still there
It also has a survey link where you can submit comments. The key thing about this plan is that it's
dramatically different than other active transportation plans the department has ever published before.
It not only identifies existing trails, greenways, and active transportation corridors, it identifies
potential areas, areas of need, but it also specifically notes that
the Department of Transportation will build sidewalks where sidewalks are needed. That's a,
I would call it a, it's revolutionary. Because when I worked at the Department of Transportation, we
weren't in the business of building sidewalks. And they weren't in the business of building sidewalks
up until a few years ago. Now it's active, particularly in small locations, smaller,
villages and roadways communities along state highways. Indot will build those. Indot will also actively
seek to promote active transportation along those corridors within those small communities. You won't
be seeing these along state highways and large rural areas, but you will be seeing them in
smaller communities. Questions? Anybody?
County flood man Yeah a while back both the city and the county were contacted through through the chain
of By the US Army Corps of Engineers Louisville they are reaching out to
communities to try and identify areas in Indiana that experience severe roadway flooding. This isn't
loading. Oh, there we go, okay. Sorry, areas in Indiana that experience severe roadway flooding are
potentially where fatalities or high water rescues have occurred, and they're doing this research as
part of their flood safety and messaging signage campaign.
So as part of this Request I learned about the county's map and I thought I would let John talk about
it And Lynette's here as well and Ben Ayers from the highway department who might have some more insight
But yeah, just for some background we were contacted by I believe it's a group called the silver jackets
which sounds kind of like an interesting like superhero
Group maybe but they're actually Army Corps of Engineers folks a long-standing organization within the
Army Corps Looking and there's a funding opportunity and I believe it was Tammy Berman from planning
was the one who was contacted So this was a collaborative effort between the Mineral County Planning
Office emergency management the silver jackets and the highway department and then the GIS just was
facilitating but what we did was we took our roadside inventory
Within Monroe County Highway Department for where these signs might be and then also locations that
were noted by the Monroe County Fire Protection District as well as EMA of areas where no and flooding
occurred across these roads and that's what this map is showing right now along with a flood zone layer
from the Department of Natural Resources to get an idea of you know, these areas
Maybe right now we haven't witnessed flooding, but in 20 years we could be seeing things as well.
So yeah, the goal for this is to essentially utilize funds that are existing to put those signs up that
say turn around, don't drown, right? I think it was five or six years ago we had a fatality in Bloomington,
right, where somebody drove into Clear Creek after it got really, one of those torrential downpours.
So this is a great program and something that I think would really just be a benefit for everybody.
Awesome. When I learned about your map, I thought it would be good to share with the group just so everyone
was aware that it existed. Yeah. Thanks, Katie. And again, another resource just to share with you,
but there's a 2026 Roadmap to Safety report that is out there if anybody's interested in seeing it.
There is a States at a Glance section with their
three categories of rating and Indiana does fall in the cautious section. And so this gives a kind of
gives a number on the billions of dollars, the annual cost due to motor vehicle crashes, the number
of fatalities in 2024, the 10 year fatality total. And then it also talks about various laws that have
been adopted or not yet adopted.
And so that could be an interesting report for anyone who's interested in that. Questions? Okay, I just
wanted to share that the MPO in March received extra, received a notice from INDOT that we would be receiving
some extra funds for fiscal year 2026. Every MPO in the state did receive some level of extra funds.
And our amount that we're receiving is 47,894. So not too high of a number in terms of transportation
projects, but it is extra funding nonetheless. So I just wanted to share that bit of news.
Or Pat I just realized now see we did miss agenda item six point six I don't if we want to cover that
at the end of this. Does that sound good? Yes. Okay. Sorry about that Item six point ten is a memo regarding
a meeting that the MPO staff is
city staff and county staff had on April 8th at this meeting we discussed three three main points the
first being the use of the extra forty seven thousand almost forty eight thousand dollars in fiscal
year 26 funds that we're receiving from in dot. Those have to be used by September 30th of 26.
And so the group at the meeting agreed to grant these funds to the downtown curb ramps phase five project
since they were slated to receive funds in fiscal year 26 but were not able to because of cuts to the
funding. The next item that we discussed was that the city of Bloomington and the county both have a
preference to move
their projects, two of their projects, College and Walnut phase one and Dillman, old 37 and Dillman.
They desire to move them up to the next fiscal year for a variety of reasons. And so to make this possible,
we had to kind of figure out if the funds that were left upon them moving could be used.
And there are a few MPOs out there that are looking for trades. And so we discussed the possibility
of using two of those trades to help us reshift the money around to allow Dillman 37 to move from fiscal
year 28 to 29 and to allow college and wanted to move from 29 to 30. And just a reminder that the fiscal
year is from July 1st to June 30th.
And so as part of these bullet points in here describe what would need to take place to try and reallocate
those funds to the projects and use as much of the funding as possible while still allowing those projects to move.
So in the end the group agreed it would be beneficial to move forward with both funding exchanges which
would allow both projects to move to their desired fiscal years. The third item we talked about was
that as a result of this trade
and project moving scenario, there would be some extra funds left over, 162,000 in fiscal year 28 and
97,000 in fiscal year 29 that we would need to figure out where to allocate. And we decided to postpone
the decision for these until a later date. There are projects that can use those funds. We just have
to figure out how we're gonna divvy it up.
Any questions. I have one question. Sorry. This is very helpful. I didn't read this beforehand. The
note about the MPO can't promise a return of the remaining six percent of funds to the college and walnut
project in the future. Is that kind of why agenda item three like to try and reduce any loss in the trade.
but then still do the trade? Or are you saying you're just not going to do the trade at all? No, it
just means that the city was willing to keep the project in the fiscal year if it didn't result in total
or too many loss of funds. And doing this trade scenario,
does result in the College and Walnut Project not getting as many funds in its new fiscal year of fiscal
year 30. And so it just means that right now all of the fiscal year 30 funds are allocated and that
there aren't any available at this time. And by the time there might be additional available,
There will probably be another another tip. So we'll have made all of these decisions all over again
And when you do the trades, right, there's no inflation adjustment like they get the other LPA the other
agency gets the money For two million and then in a year we get just the two million back Okay, it's
a direct trade. Thank you. I
that if I can just to acknowledge that I Think from the city's perspective we we kind of wanted that
noted as well that we're not we're not coming back a hundred percent hole from these trades, but it's
very close and The trades are advantageous to us to a point where even though there's some small percentage
where we're not getting back We want we just want to say hey, yeah, we know we're not quite getting
it all back or not guaranteed it all back but
We also acknowledge this is beneficial and want to move forward and appreciate Katie all of your time
and kind of figuring out how to make all of this work. And I will add that we you'll not be voting on
these changes at this point because the meeting was not that long ago and we have to go through the
go through with the trades.
At the next meeting, you'll be voting on all of these changes formally. Will you talk about the conflict?
Okay, I'm going to jump back to the conflict of interest. This is something that was new to us. City
clerk advised us in February.
that all members of the well citizens advisory committee technical advisory committee and the policy
committee were subject to completing a conflict of interest questionnaire. We did this in 2022 but we
had not been directed in between that time either before or after 2022 to have the conflict of interest
questionnaire completed. However
She was rather adamant about it. It's State Board of Accounts is requiring the conflict of interest
questionnaire. So we've sent out a notice to all the members of all three committees. Citizens Advisory
Committee, we got 100% compliance. Thank you very much. Tech Advisory Committee, we still have nine
names and I'm not gonna say out loud who they are.
I'll just contact you directly with an email About the fact that we will need you to complete a questionnaire
conflict of question interest questionnaire and then on the MPO Policy Committee we had Three people
that have still not completed the questionnaire that will work on that the questionnaire just make sure
that you don't have a financial interest in any of the decisions made by this body even though
two of the committees are advisory only the requirement is that you still have to do the questionnaire
and if you're a proxy we will ask you to do the questionnaire also just in case so if you have any questions
please let me know catch me after the meeting I'll be happy to talk to you about that and then also
please feel free to contact city clerk if you want to go
Pass me to ask for more detailed questions Thank you, I Guess the only question I have about that was
this Questionnaire that all boards and commissions were to fill out so like the planning like the Bloomington
Planning Commission all boards and commissions and even staff They I was identified as one of the people
that had to fill out the questionnaire. So yeah and Katie too. Thanks Pat. I
Back down to six point eleven I wanted to share just one update from an in dot project The SR 45 10th
Street Project from the bypass to Pete Ellis Drive intersection improvements with added turn lanes if
you might remember that there was some Some questions about the trees that were slated for removal The
update on that is that
They did do some redesign to the Pete Ellis side and they were able to preserve eight trees that were
previously slated for removal. The redesign includes shorter storage lengths for the turn lanes on Pete
Ellis, but the overall scope of the project remains unchanged. So that's the update on the tree issue
for that one. The letting for that project took place April 8th, 26.
With credit for Crider and Crider got the lowest bid and then the next couple months will be Utility
relocations and construction is anticipated So I meant to oops switch over here construction is anticipated
In To begin in spring of 27 and
The contract is expected to be completed in spring of 28. And then I wanted to invite Neil or Lynette
if you guys want to share any updates on your your tip projects that you have. Yeah I can just quickly
run through the list and then happy to answer any questions. Our second street project is in utility
relocations and then we'll
Quickly shift into construction throughout this year. We have a curb ramp project called downtown curb
ramps phase four that will go to bid this fall and includes numerous locations in the downtown area
So we're excited for that getting close to bidding You have curb ramps phase five that we're just now
starting design. We just issued notice to proceed to a consultant that
Project is expected to focus on crosswalks improvements in the areas of third and at water just south
of IU campus Our high street project. We just wrapped up right away acquisition We're in utility relocation
this year throughout 2026 and then we'll be in construction next year in 2027 we have a
Crosswalks phase three project that is still in design And we have crosswalks phase four that is out
in the future. We haven't started yet We're looking at consultant selection by the end of this year
We have a multi-use path project on North Dunn Street We're in design on that. They're just getting
started on right-of-way appraisals to start right-of-way acquisition and
And then for our two college walnut phases, those have not started, but we're hoping to get into consultant
selection soon. I think that's the full list of our federal funded projects at the moment. Thanks. Okay.
For Monroe County, for the Eagleson Avenue bridge, the pre-construction meeting was on March 31st, 2026.
We're going to be in to have bi-weekly meetings.
to keep up to date with utility relocations. The Rockport Road Bridge pre-construction meeting was on
April 17th. The construction will begin June 1st. CLR is the contractor. Dillman Road Bridge, still
on schedule and working on design. For the intersection improvement at Old State Road 37 South and Dillman
Road, you mentioned this, but we worked with the MPO and Citi to move the project to construction year
of fiscal year twenty twenty nine and then the last one is the countywide bridge inspections and inventory
that was completed in March and that's our required compliance month. Thank you guys so much. So I believe
we're on to old business and it doesn't look like there's anything there. So it's a new business I guess.
Yes, we have some some tip updates that do need voting on they are described in the memo that you see
The first Proposed Amendment to the tip is the addition of a end up project called ID IQ bridge maintenance
and repair with a total project cost of a million dollars There is
not a specific location for this at this time. This is kind of just a general project that they add
into the various counties and districts, and then they decide where they're going to use it. Similarly,
we have another new project to add called the District Paving Project. This does have slightly more
specific locations
There's it involves paving in various locations of Monroe County SR 45 south of Martin Drive and then
a couple other counties as well Again, they just give us they give us total project cost and then they
kind of make everyone added to their tip who who's involved I
The third amendment we need to make to the tip is a new project from NDOT called Traffic Signal Modernization
in various locations of Monroe and Owen counties. This is a total project cost of 500,000, scheduled
for, construction scheduled for 2029, fiscal year 2029. And the fourth update,
for the tip is to update the funding for the slide correction on I-69 from SR-37 in Monroe County to
Morgan County. So the funding type was changed. The right-of-way phase was moved up to 2030 from 2026 to 2030.
due to the stability of the project. And then the total project cost was raised a little bit. And the
construction phase was moved out of the TIP to 2031 or 2032, again, because of the stability of the
project. The fifth amendment that we have is an update
for the funding for the downtown curb ramps phase five project the PE phase total what needs to be updated
to the actual contract amount of 271 490,000 then we're taking away the funds that it was allocated
this year but then wasn't able weren't able to use
because there wasn't enough available. That is something we talked about in a previous meeting. The
project cost was raised a little bit due to the new PE contract. And then the PE phase is moving to
fiscal year 27 because there's not sufficient time to do all of the needed steps to use that extra funding
I guess I should have said we'll also be adding that extra funding that we talked about on April 8th
with the LPAs, that $47,000 that we're getting for fiscal year 26 that we're able to use up until September.
And so just technicality is that we have to move the PE phase to fiscal year 27 because the
Paperwork for that will not be able to occur until fiscal year 27 I Know my explanation for that was
a little haphazard. So if you're confused, please let me know Can you clarify what the PE stands for
preliminary engineering? Perfect. Thank you
So per Procedures the TAC will vote to recommend that the Recommend or deny that the policy committee
recommend or deny approval of these amendments Move approval Second do we need to do public comment?
Yeah before we go to vote we should do public comment and if there's a public comment about this, please
This is your opportunity If you're online you can go ahead and unmute yourselves and speak if you have
any public comments We're not hearing any
So I believe it was Jane and Neil, so I guess it would be a vote. Okay. Streamata? Yes. Beighton? Yes.
Gilliland? Fleek? Yes. Gellin? Yes.
Yes. Jackson. Copper. Yes. Blair. Abstain. Whitmer. Yes. Nickel. Yes. Tavernier. Yes. Wellings. Yes.
Wells. Abstain.
Gilliland abstain, sorry Gilliland abstain, okay Motion passes with three abstain abstentions Great,
thanks Katie. I believe this is now time for public comments on matters not included on the agenda So
anybody here that wishes to make a public comment feel free or folks online as well. I
Not seeing anybody here doesn't seem like anybody online either. I don't see any hands raised or anything
like that. So I guess this moves us to communications from community members or from committee members
on matters not included on the agenda. So non voting items anybody have anything they want to share.
I do want to give a an acknowledgement to the city parks department and I believe also planning and
engineering as well. I'm a big runner in town and about a month ago and I'm remiss for not acknowledging
this earlier. I went on the beeline and I went further on the beeline than I ever have before. And so
the extension of the beeline past Adams Street is just great. You can go all the way up to 17th Street
and go further than that as well. But it was just a nice
Extra little bit of distance to cover and get to see new part of town. So yeah great work and it's just
a great contribution to the city Thanks, John, I guess we'll move on to topics for future agendas if
folks have those as well Does not seem like it it looks like we have some upcoming meetings that are
happening and
Today the 22nd. So today we have the citizens advisory committee meeting which is going to be at 5 30 p.m
It's a hybrid meeting on the 24th We have our policy committee meeting at 10 30 a.m And then our next
technical advisory committee meeting will be May 27th 2026. Is that right after Memorial Day? Okay Something
I must be yes, it's after okay And that's gonna be a hybrid as well
I believe That's it. Can I get a motion to adjourn? So moved Second second. Okay. Thanks Jane, and I
believe was that Kelly who got second or Nate? Sure second. Okay. We got Kelly Whitner at the second.
So thanks everybody Have a great rest of your week. Thanks staff and we'll see you guys May 27th Thanks. Thank you