AMERICAN PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION ASSOCIATION

Metropolitan Planning Subcommittee Meeting

Omni Parker House

Gardner

Boston, MA

August 4

5:15 – 6:15 p.m.

AGENDA

Welcome Remarks and Introductions

  • Lee Gibson, co-chair; and Chief Executive Officer, Regional Transportation Commission of Washoe County, Reno, NV

Discussion on Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on Statewide and Nonmetropolitan Transportation Planning; Metropolitan Transportation Planning

  • Draft APTA comments
  • Additional items for comments

Peer exchanges and technical assistance

Upcoming conferences participation

Other Business

Adjourn

AMERICAN PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION ASSOCIATION

Metropolitan Planning Subcommittee Meeting

Seattle, Washington

Monday, October 1

5:30 – 6:30

DRAFT MINUTES

Attendants: Lee Gibson, Jennifer Mitchell, Paul Bay, Rosemary Covington, Anja Graves, Diana Mendes, Brian Shapiro, Alma Haskell, Phillip Lae, Pat Piras, Robert Ryan, Patricia Doersch (APTA), Nicole DuPuis (APTA) Rich Weaver (APTA), Jetris Hamilton (APTA), Naomi Renek, Don Emerson, Patty Doersch, Art Guzzetti, Sherry Riklin.

Welcome Remarks and Introductions: Lee Gibson, co-chair, welcomed everyone to the meeting. He introduced Jennifer Mitchell, co-chair.He explained that we need to re-energize this subcommittee. MAP-21 will present a number of procedural changes in terms of how we interface with the highway sector. We need to think through programs and initiatives for engagement and who we can work with to educate our new found MPO partners about what APTA is and what transit is about. This is especially timely and there will be a renewed focus on activities at the metropolitan level and MPO level. Jennifer Mitchell noted that with the new metropolitan planning provisions in MAP-21, the subcommittee will have a role both in disseminating information to APTA members and MPO partners, and also soliciting input for FTA’s decision-making process.

MAP 21 Items for Discussion

  • Transit representation on MPO: MAP-21 states that within two years, MPOs in urbanized areas designated as transportation management areas must include officials of public transit agencies that administer or operate major modes of transportation, as well as representatives of public transit operators, on MPO policy boards.
  • FTA has not yet defined ‘major modes of transportation’ or whether these representatives should have full voting rights on all matters.
  • We should look at the draft subcommittee mission statement, and think about adding more relevant action on MAP-21 implementation. This may be a starting point for getting into the performance measures.
  • FTA is working to identify all of the MPOs and the composition of their boards. However there are some issues in trying to determine what interests each board member represents. For example, a local government representative may sit on both an MPO board and a transit board; however they might represent their local government first in funding-related issues.
  • In addition to the work Paul Bay has done, there is work that Tom Jenkins has done on MPO board representation. We should take the work that Paul did and compare it to the previous survey Pat Piras has from years ago. Pat Piras pointed to the issue in the bay area, the fact that all of the various transit agencies (with the exception of two, AC Transit and BART) have the ability to be represented on the MPO board. We should point out that the staff is not the MPO, the MPO is defined as the policy board.
  • Performance measures: There is a great deal of work to be done in both education and information dissemination. The conversation needs to start before the rulemaking begins, because MPOs will then have only 90 days to implement the rule. While the transit performance measures are limited to safety and SGR, there are some on the highway side that will affect transit, so we want to have a hand in those issues too. Regarding the TIP, we need to come around some basic principles about what kind of measures and targets should be in those documents. The performance measurement is intended to measure the TIP and the long range plan as a whole.
  • The intent of the performance measures is to find out what has been accomplished with Federal funds. Therefore the performance measures will need a strong emphasis on outcomes. Outcomes are locally determined. The state and transit system must negotiate targets with MPO.The congestion relief measure is used throughout the law. USDOT must identify what the measure is, while the states will comeup with targets.
  • Performance measures are not intended to be a hammer for the federal government. It was more focused on local collaboration. We need to make sure that transit is step by step with highway, and make sure the program is implemented in a way that doesn’t bring a hammer down.
  • Sherry Riklin discussed the work that FTA and FHWA are doing to reach out to local agencies. FHWA (in cooperation with FTA) has held several workshops with the purpose of identifying the framework of performance based planning. They moved from identifying the framework to workshops that brought MPOs, State DOTs and agencies came together to discuss their interactions. There will be about seven total: three have been held so far, and there will be four more. It was noted that some transit agencies may not realize the FHWA workshops will address transit-related measures as well.
  • Actions the subcommittee can take to help facilitate this conversation: We need to educate people on the existence of this committee. We should look at initial best practices, ways that some regions are working to manage this. We could also support FTA’s Technical Assistance efforts.
  • Other next steps:
  • Outreach to AMPO members.
  • Develop a “crosswalk” between the 7 national goals and the 10 performance targets.
  • Distribute the subcommittee’s mission statement to the entire Policy and Planning committee.
  • Develop a subcommittee action plan
  • Identify issues for input into the FTA/FHWA rulemaking process on performance-based planning; these issues may be categorized by size of the transit systems or urban areas.
  • Reach out to the APTA Legal Affairs committee regarding any research they are doing on board representation issues.

Adjourn at 6:31 p.m.

ACTION ITEMS

WHAT / WHO / WHEN
We need to develop an action plan for MAP-21. This will include information regarding what we think concerns will be for small, medium and large cities for rulemaking. / APTA staff, Committee leadership. / ASAP
We need to educate people (members and other stakeholders) on the existence of this committee. It would be useful to send to the Policy and Planning Committee Members the goals and missions of this committee and the action items of the committee on MAP-21. / ASAP staff, Committee leadership / ASAP
Schedule a meeting with AMPO leadership (Charlie Howard). / APTA staff, Committee leadership / ASAP
We need a call to action. We should send out a notice of the October 25th webinar. / APTA staff / ASAP
We should look at the goals and measures that we know. There are the national goals and the targeted measures, and we need to look at them and see how they match up. Salt Lake City has a good start on this. / APTA staff, Committee leadership / ASAP
We should reach out to the Legal Affairs Committee on these issues. / APTA staff, Committee leadership. / ASAP