April 2015 Volume 9, Number 3

Spotlight on MobilityNewsletter

In this Issue:

AlamoAreaMetropolitan Planning Organization

Photo credit: Cecilio Martinez, Alamo Area MPO

Page 2Letter from the Chair

Page 4Air Quality Season is Here

Page 6Spotlight on- Bridge Slides

Page 3Federal Certifi cation Review

Page 519th Annual Walk & Roll Rally Set

Page 7Proposition 1 Funding and the Alamo Area MPO

Ray Lopez, Chariman, Alamo Area MPOCity Councilman District 6,

City of San Antonio

Spotlight on Mobility is published quarterly by the Alamo Area Metropolitan Planning Organization and highlights information related to the MPO, partner agencies and projects.

All articles within may be reproduced, unless otherwise noted, without permission when credit is given to the author (if listed) and Spotlight on Mobility, a publication of the Alamo Area MPO, and the organization website, www.alamoareampo.org is listed.

Welcome to the Spring issue of Spotlight on Mobility!

As we welcome Spring we are also welcoming the return of Ozone season – a time of year where we are all reminded that good air quality is essential to being able to enjoy all that the region has to offer. For the Alamo Area Metropolitan Planning Organization, we know that being able to reduce ground level ozone truly requires a team effort. No one entity, working alone, can address the impacts of ozone.

Working with our partner agencies across the region, we are watching closely what the Environmental Protection Agency will set as new ozone standards. If we are designated non-attainment for ozone (we don’t meet the new standard), the MPO will be required to implement additional planning processes to reduce ozone levels. We continue to promote active modes of transportation, including walking, bicycling, carpooling and mass transit throughout the region. Beyond helping with air quality, these active modes also can help promote a healthier community – who doesn’t want to take some time on a spring day to ride a bike as a way to relax and stay fi t?

Spring also means we are preparing for our 19th Annual Walk & Roll Rally and National Bicycle Month in May. We hope you will be able to join us in taking part in activities during the month of May to promote bicycling, walking, and generally enjoying being outdoors and active.

We are also preparing for our Federal Certifi cation Review. The Federal Highway Administration and Federal Transit Administration conduct an in-depth review of each large MPO every four years to ensure that MPOs are meeting federal planning requirements, and to ensure that the major planning issues facing a metropolitan area are being addressed.

In this issue, we have articles on each of these topics and more.

Thank you all for taking the time to stay informed about what we at the MPO are doing to keep our region moving!

Until next time,

Ray LopezChairmanTransportation Policy Board

Letter from the Chair

Transportation Policy Board Members

Councilman Ray Lopez, MPO ChairCommissioner Kevin Wolff, MPO Vice-Chair

Ms. Rebecca CedilloMr. John Clamp

Commissioner Tommy Calvert, Jr.Commissioner Sergio Rodriguez

Ms. Renee Green, P.E.Councilman Jeff Haberstroh Mayor Pro Tem Ron Reaves

Councilmember Mike GallagherCouncilmember Shirley GonzalesCouncilmember Ron Nirenberg

Mr. John DuganMr. Mike Frisbie, P.E.

Mayor Don KeilCommissioner Kevin Webb

Mayor Chris RileyJudge Kyle Kutscher

Mayor Tom DalyMr. Mario Jorge, P.E.Dr. Richard Gambitta

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Planning for our future transportation needs cannot be done in a vacuum. It requires public participation, input from our partner agencies, and a cooperative process that continually reexamines how our region is growing to make sure our plans refl ect the challenges and opportunities around us.

Our region just completed the update to our long-range transportation plan, Mobility 2040, which was adopted in December 2014 and took over two years to create. With the input of the public and our partner agencies, we have included transportation projects that are vital to communities – projects that are the keys to continued growth and economic success.

How does this tie into our Federal Certifi cation Review? Just as our long-range plan update process involved numerous stakeholders to help us develop a multi-modal plan for the next 25 years, the Federal Certifi cation Review helps us identify the best practices we are using as an MPO, helps us identify areas where improvements could be made and lets our federal partners, the Federal Highway Administration and Federal Transit Administration hear from citizens on how the MPO is doing in addressing the major transportation planning issues facing our region.

A Federal Certifi cation Review is held every four years to ensure that we, as an MPO, are in compliance with federal requirements for the transportation planning process. As part of this review, our federal partners will be hosting a public listening session to receive input on how the MPO is doing on Monday, April 27, 2015 starting at 6:00 p.m. in the Community Room at the VIA Metro Center located at 1021 San Pedro Avenue, San Antonio, Texas 78212. More information can be found on our website at www.alamoareampo.org.

Your participation in the public listening session, and in submitting comments to the Federal Review Team, are key to helping us improve the planning process for the region.

Federal Certifi cation Review

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Public Listening SessionMonday, April 27, 2015

6:00 p.m.VIA Metro Center

1021 San Pedro AvenueSan Antonio, Texas 78212

The Ozone season is here and lasts from April 1st through October 31st. This season we hope to have lower levels of ground level ozone and need your help in achieving that.

Why is Ground Level Ozone dangerous?

According to the Environmental Protection Agency,”… research, indicates that ozone exposure may increase the risk of premature death from heart or lung disease”. Repeated exposure may permanently scar lung tissue. The most susceptible group it can affect are those with lung diseases but it can also affect those without lung issues. Ozone can aggravate lung diseases such as asthma, emphysema, and chronic bronchitis. It can make it more diffi cult to take deep breathes, cause shortness of breath, cause sore throat or coughing and make the lungs more susceptible to infection. Ground-level ozone can also damage trees, plants, and reduce visibility. When you see that the forecast is calling for high ozone levels, limit your exposure by staying inside.

Ozone is most likely to reach unhealthy levels on hot sunny days. High winds can also assist ozone in travelling great distances from urban areas to those in rural portions of a region. For this reason, any portion of a community can experience high ozone levels.

Air Quality Season is Here

When an “Air Quality Health Alert” is announced, do your part by utilizing one or more of the following:

• Refuel after 6 p.m.• Avoid drive-thru lanes; park and go inside to conduct business.• Drive less, walk or bicycle, combine errands, and/or pre-plan to minimize trips.• Use mass transit, such as VIA or Connect Seguin, when you can. For more information visit

www.viainfo.net or contact Connect Seguin at art@aacog.com. • Use teleconferencing instead of driving to meetings or bundle meetings together.• Try to avoid morning rush hour, ask your employer about fl ex-schedules or compressed

workweeks.• Take your lunch to work or school and avoid mid-day trips and errands.• Keep your vehicles well maintained in order to reduce tailpipe emissions.• Postpone landscaping work using small gasoline engines until after 6 p.m.• Share a ride to work or school. For more information, visit the Commute Solutions website at

www.nuride.com.

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Please do your part to help us continue to enjoy clean air.Please do your part to help us continue to enjoy clean air.

This May, the Alamo Area MPO celebrates our 19th year of Walk & Roll activities. Using healthy transportation options, such as biking and walking, and using mass transit to commute, helps build physical activity into your daily routine, decreases air pollutants, and calms traffi c.

To encourage the benefi ts of healthy transportation choices, we will kick off the month of May with the 19th Annual Walk & Roll Rally. On Friday, May 1st ride your bike, walk over, or ride VIA to join us at Main Plaza in the heart of downtown San Antonio, and help us celebrate healthy transportation choices for our region.

In partnership with the City of San Antonio and Bexar County, the Walk & Roll Rally is the MPO’s annual activity to encourage non-motorized transportation as a choice for our region. Throughout the month, the MPO will be using some of our region’s most active healthy transportation corridors - popping up on the greenway trails and bike share stations - to chat about biking and walking safety and distribute free safety materials, including bike helmets! Be on the lookout for these random acts of bike safety!

May is also National Bike Month. Check out the Walk & Roll calendar at www.alamoareampo.org/walkandroll for activities such as the Green Spaces Alliance’s Sicloverde bike ride on May

9th and Main Plaza Conservancy’s BIKE|BEAT on May 16th. If your group is planning an event that supports riding a bike or walking, let us know so we can promote your effort. Send your event details to walkandroll@alamoareampo.org as soon as possible.

While we’ll be highlighting healthy transportation throughout May, riding a bike and walking are year-round options for our community. From Street Skills classes to Bike Rodeo-in-a-Box, from walkable community workshops to general presentations from the MPO, we have resources available to help you make healthy transportation an active part of your life.

We hope you’ll Walk & Roll with us in May and year-round to learn more about our region’s healthy transportation options.

19th Annual Walk & Roll Rally Set

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Photos:TxDOT, San Antonio

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To see video of the bridge Slide, please visitwww.youtube.com/txdotsanantonio

Have you ever seen a bridge slide? If you have been near Fredericksburg Road and Medical Drive in the South Texas Medical Center in the past few months, you may have seen one and not realized it.

The improvements being done at this intersection have been planned for years. The bridge will separate these two major corridors and the fi nished product will allow Medical Drive a direct route into the South Texas Medical Center by passing under the now-bridged Fredericksburg Road. Included in this project are improved sidewalks and pedestrian features, improved drainage, and congestion relief for 33,000 cars per day.

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For the fi rst time in Texas, a bridge was constructed off site and was slid into place as part of the improvements and reconstruction of the intersection of Fredericksburg Road and Medical Drive. Called a Lateral-Slide bridge placement, this technique, while used across the nation, had never been done in Texas before.

Texas Sterling Construction, the contractor on this project, proposed using this technique, which used hydraulic jacks and liquid dish soap to slide the bridge deck into place. Instead of taking two months to complete construction of a new bridge on site and in place, the bridge slide allowed the bridge to be in place just eight days after the intersection was closed.

The road was excavated 30 feet to expose bridge supports built underground over the summer. Specialized crews brought in by Texas Sterling Construction set each slab, weighing about two million pounds apiece, on Tefl on coated steel plates covered with Dawn dish soap then used hydraulic jacks to push the decks individually at a rate of 4-6 inches per minute. The entire sliding process took just 27 hours.

The Alamo Area MPO is proud to spotlight this fi rst in the state of Texas effort undertaken by the Texas Department of Transportation.

Spotlight on- Bridge Slides

Proposition 1 Funding and the Alamo Area MPO

In November 2014, Texas voters overwhelmingly approved an amendment to the Texas Constitution known as Proposition 1. This amendment, which places additional funding into the state highway fund, also known as Fund 6, has been able to bring in an additional $1.76 Billion for road projects throughout the State this year.

For the Alamo Area, when all the appropriate funding formulas are applied to the available funding, we received approximately $147.29 Million for projects that will be released for construction before the end of August 2015. Beyond breaking ground on some needed improvements in our area, Proposition 1 funding has also given us the ability to program future projects into our long-range plan.

In Mobility 2040, our adopted twenty-fi ve year plan, we anticipated being able to receive approximately $650 Million in funding from Proposition 1. We were conservative in our estimating, and assumed that we would receive $65 Million a year for at least ten years. Being able to receive double that allocation in the fi rst year of the program means projects are able to advance quicker than we thought they could.

However, with the recent decline in oil prices, and the slowing of work in the Eagle Ford Shale region, the future years for funding from Proposition 1 remain to be seen. We know that as prices rebound additional funding will come in for transportation projects. We know that the needs for improvements to our roadways will continue to be present. We know that, with our funding assumptions in place, our partner agencies are able to start the environmental work necessary to have projects lined up and ready to go to construction as funding becomes available.

If your project wasn’t included in this fi rst round of funded projects, don’t despair. Projects can still be considered for additional funding in future years from Proposition 1, or other sources of funding that could become available. The important thing now is for the environmental and engineering work to be undertaken in order to get projects ready to go to construction.

Proposition 1 is a great tool for our region, and for the entire state, to be able to use to help advance needed transportation projects. We look forward to being able to report to our community the continued success of this new stream of funding in helping keep everyone moving!

Reduce CongestionImprove Safety

Create New JobsReduce Wear and Tear

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Alamo Area Metropolitan Planning Organization825 South Saint Mary’s StreetSan Antonio, Texas 78205www.alamoareampo.org

MPO Staff

“We Plan to Keep You Moving!”

AlamoAreaMetropolitan Planning Organization

Stay Connected.

www.alamoareampo.org (210) 227-8651 aampo@alamoareampo.org

Isidro (Sid) Martinez Director

Félix EscamillaOffi ce Manager/HR Generalist

Cecilio MartinezSenior GIS/Web Analyst

Lori StewartAdministrative Assistant

Allison BlazoskyBicycle/Pedestrian Transportation Planner

Tabitha BustamanteFront Desk Coordinator

Clayton ElkinsGIS/Web Analyst

Jaclynn CedilloMultimedia Specialist

Jeanne GeigerDeputy Director

Leroy D. AllowayPlanning and Public Involvement Program Manager

Zachary GrahamSenior Transportation Modeler

Nicolas PageAir Quality/Environmental Planner

Alberto A. AltamiranoBilingual Public Involvement Specialist

Travis NedrichGIS Analyst

Christine TremblayGrants Financial Coordinator

Ambar PerezSenior Administrative Assistant