Recommendation Authorizing the Mayor to Sign a Letter of Support for the Oakland Alameda Access Project (OAAP). (Planning, Building and Transportation 4227287)
So we have a number of of very capable, knowledgeable folks with us. And, man, have there been a lot of conversations lately, but we're going to have a few more. So in addition to our stellar city staff planning building transportation director Andrew Thomas, Rochelle Wheeler, who's a project manager on our estuary bridge project. We also have the executive director of the Alameda County Transportation Commission, Tesla Shell. So it's a pleasure to have her come out on such a blustery night to join us in Alameda. And also, we have some consultants and staff from consults to the Alameda County Transportation Commission, a consultant, but also Alameda resident Rodney Pimentel, also a bridge engineer. And I know staff from AC, DC and RMS Trinity Nguyen. Good evening. Nice to see you. And consultancies and chain. And. Find this anywhere, any way. Mr. Thomas, this is your staff report. And how would you like to how would you like to proceed? Well, I think what I'd like to do. Good evening, Mayor Ashcraft and members of the Council, Andrew Thomas, Planning Building and Transportation Director. And I'm assisted tonight by transportation coordinator, senior transportation coordinator Rochelle Wheeler, who's been the project manager for the city of Alameda. And thank you for introducing the very capable staff from the Alameda County Transportation Commission, because this is really their project. We're bringing it to you tonight because we're recommending to the city of Alameda take a position in support of the project. What we would like to do tonight is give you an overview of the project, just so that everybody in Alameda sort of understands the nature of the project. And then we can talk about some of the, you know, sort of follow on projects and issues that we've been talking about over the last few days with the staff of the Army, the County Transportation Commission. And then I'd like to give an opportunity, if it's with your support, if it's okay with the council, to let the Army County Transportation Commission add whatever they would like to the to the presentation at the beginning just to inform your your conversation with the full council. I hope the Council would be agreeable to that. And I want to also add that so I represent Alameda on the Alameda County Transportation Commission. The Vice Mayor, John Knox Wade is my alternate on that commission. And these are big, important projects we're talking about. So let's get started. Okay, Ashley, are you running the PowerPoint? Or Laura? I am. Yes, I am going to run it and I'm trying to get it started. Just give me a sec. All right. Because Laura basically runs this organization here. All right. Thank you. Flawlessly. All right. Beautiful. All right. Well, that's not the beginning, though. Let's go to the start. Here we go. Let's back it up. Okay. This is called the Oakland Alameda Access Project. This is a project that's named a named project in which the voters approved first about 15, 20 years ago and then again measure bb5 years ago. And it is a project to improve the connections between Alameda, the city of Oakland and the I-80 Freeway. Next slide, please. What we're asking tonight is that the mayor signed a letter of support for the project addressed to the Alameda County Transportation Commission. And we have a draft letter for your review tonight for the full council review. This has been a project that has been a long time in the making. It really got started back in 1997. So it's been about 25 years we've been trying to do this and it's been a many, many failed attempts to try to improve the access around this freeway, the I-80 freeway in Oakland. But in the last four years. Do almost entirely to the really great work by the Army County Transportation Commission staff. We now have a project that we think is a benefit to both Oakland and Alameda and the region. Next slide, please. The purpose and need for this, the sort of the guiding sort of objectives were to improve safety and reduce conflicts between regional and local traffic, enhance bicycle and pedestrian accessibility and connectivity within the area, improve mobility and accessibility for travelers between the freeway, the Webster Posi tubes, the city of Oakland, downtown neighborhoods in the city of Alameda, and then reduce freeway bound regional traffic and congestion on local roadways and area neighborhoods. Next slide. It's been a tough, tough project. We have been some of us have been working on this for almost 20 years. And it's it's a difficult project because you've got an old freeway running through a dense urban area. And we have many stakeholders, obviously, the city of Oakland, the city of Alameda, the Jack London neighborhood, the Chinatown neighborhood, all sorts of interest groups, bike and pedestrian groups, landmark groups. And then, of course, with each year, more and more residents living closer to these interchanges and these on ramps and off ramps, so not an easy task to try to redesign freeway access in an established urban area. Next slide, please. It's a it's not going to be cheap. The voters approved $75 million for this project if we could figure out a solution. Ictsi has come up with another 6 million or excuse me, another ten or so. We're up to about $86 million of secured funding. But as you can see in this table, the total project cost is estimated now at close to 120 million. So there is additional funding still needed in the order of approximately $33 million that still need to be secured before we can construct this entire project. Next slide, please. It can be done in phases or in in chunks. There's what we call the core project, which we'll show you in a minute. But then there's a number of additional pieces to the project that we'd like that are included in the project. Description. A number of improvements in Chinatown for bike and pedestrian improvements. The Oak Street Cycle track in in Oakland at $6 million. A new walkway through the Webster tube at 7 million. Some improvements on the Alameda side of the of the tubes for bicycle and pedestrian improvements at about a million. So when you add it all up and then the sixth Street improvements in Oakland, another 34 million. So it gets you up there pretty quickly to about $120 million. We'd like to just give everybody a kind of a quick overview of what this project will, how it will change the experience from an Alameda perspective. Just to remind everybody, Alameda is know this this route connecting to the I-80 freeway. What you see here on the slide is the I-80 freeway. The blue line was a26 on it. That's supposed to be Alameda Snow. When you drive out of Alameda, you go through the posey tube. You come out in Oakland under that freeway. If you're going onto the freeway northbound, you do that sort of right hand turn, another right and then another right sort of past those homes. And you get on the freeway. It's you're basically driving through Chinatown to get to the freeway if you're going southbound on 80. So do that right. And then you have to make another right and then make a left on Fifth Street and then head down Fifth Street. So it's a very convoluted approach to getting on to a freeway from a state highway. And you have to circulate through Chinatown if you're coming home to Alameda on the 880 Freeway from the south in particular, or from the north. That's what the red lines indicate. And I won't walk you through it. Alameda is know what? It's you know how to do it. It's but essentially what you can see from the red lines as you're winding through Chinatown or you're winding through the Jack London neighborhood to get to the Posey Tube entrance. Next slide, please. This is a diagram and it shows as the animation is adding in how the freeway onramp connections are going to be redesigned. We're going to show you in a minute some of the videos that our friends at CTCA prepared, which I think do a better job of illustrating it. But essentially what you see on this diagram is where today you circulate through the core of Chinatown or through the through the main streets of the Jack London District to get on and off the freeway. Now all those movements are brought closer to the main line of the freeway. So you're much you're close to the freeway. We're getting traffic out of the the neighborhoods of Jack London Square and Chinatown. And then the perimeter colors that are on Seventh Street and Oak Street represent bicycle and pedestrian improvements in the Chinatown and Jack London neighborhoods. Next slide. So we've got some videos here which we're playing. This is your trip. You're leaving Alameda, you're coming out through the posi tube and you're heading northbound on AT&T. Normally you would continue straight, but with the new with this adjustment, you can have an off ramp before the freeway and there's what we call the horseshoe. So instead of going around the into Chinatown, you're going to make that sharp, right? You're heading down Fifth Street right now. And then you're making a left and you're essentially on an onramp at this point and you're circling under the freeway. And you're making another left, and then you are on the Jackson Street Onramp. So instead of circulating through Chinatown, you've moved. Now, of course, there'll be more traffic. This is not a representation of the traffic conditions. This is just a representation showing you the new route to get onto the freeway heading northbound. Let's go to the next video. You're coming home. Heading from San Francisco, let's say. And you're heading down the. The ramp at Jackson's coming down into the Jack London Square area off the freeway. That's the horseshoe ramp just to your left and how you make. Another left turn. And another left. Normally you would head over to the Broadway. Intersection. But now what you'll be able to do is just go a few blocks. Along the edge of the freeway. This is along Sixth Street. One more block. You come to Webster Street and you make a left. And you are into the Webster, too. Coming home to Alameda. The Oak Street off ramp to Sixth Street. You've come off the freeway now. And you're heading along the new Six Street Road that is part of this project. So this is as an alternate instead of the long Broadway off street this currently you take the Broadway offramp and it takes you all the way to the Broadway intersection if you're coming from southbound 80, 80. Now you'll drop down and land at Oak Street. Go along sixth street. I'm sorry. I. That was actually at Webster. You could have. Yeah. That was that. Went past Webster. Yeah. I miss, I, I, I misrepresented that one. But let's keep moving. The, the, a number of improvements in the Oakland, Chinatown and Jack London area to improve bicycle and pedestrian safety. This these areas have been significantly impacted over the years by automobile traffic trying to get on and off that freeway. So with this rearrangement of the on ramps and off ramps, you have now the ability to really improve the urban environment in the Jack London and and and Chinatown environment to improve pedestrian bicycle safety. So really great improvement for those users. This is a diagram showing the Chinese garden park. As you come out of the posi. Whoa. Going a little too fast as you're coming out of the posi tube. You know, we we have to drive around these two blocks of Oakland to get to the freeway. By removing that movement for freeway traffic. It really provides an opportunity to improve these these two blocks and make it a much more attractive and safe place for pedestrians and bicyclists in Chinatown. Next slide. There's also a couple improvements on the Alameda side to improve bicycle and pedestrian access into the posi tube and out of the Webster tube. So the numbers on the right, number three and four are are improvements for bicycle and pedestrian access into the Posey Tube bike path, pedestrian path, and then items one and three and two on the left coming out of the Webster tube. So the improvements to allow for bicycle and pedestrian access through the Webster tube where none exists today. Next slide. And this is a cross section of the two tubes. On the right is the posey tube, where that's the existing condition. As you can see, the little three foot bike path on the right that's available today for bikes and pedestrians. On the left is a cross section of the Webster Tube, and it shows how this project will open up one of the path in the Webster tube so that now pedestrian bicyclists will have two options between to get back and forth between Oakland and Alameda. One, the existing Posey Tube and the new Webster Tube connection. Next slide, please. So as you saw in are the city staff and the draft letter that went to the Transportation Commission. On this project, the city staffs from the city of Alameda was concerned that this project, although really much needed and much overdue to improve conditions in Oakland, improve the access to the freeway, reduce pedestrian and bicycle safety issues in Oakland didn't really do enough to improve pedestrian and bicycle connections and access between Alameda and Oakland. And that is not only to really support bicyclists and pedestrians, which we need to do, but also to reduce traffic in Oakland and Chinatown. So we have been working on a feasibility study with the Oakland Alameda excuse me, the alameda county transportation commission on a bicycle and pedestrian bridge. This connecting allen west alameda to jack london square. We know this bridge is feasible to build now. We know we can build it to meet the coast guard's navigational requirements, the city, the port of Oakland's navigational and operational requirements. We know it's an expensive project and we know we have a long way to go. We still have detailed design, environmental work and we have to raise the money to do it. But it has the potential and we know from a demand study that we can reduce up about 5000, you know, that it can add approximately 5000 trips a day, would use this bicycle and pedestrian bridge if we used it. So that translates into a lot of cars that we could take out of the network if we can get this done. Next slide, please. Oh, this is just real quickly. The the the change in the routing will save time for automobile drivers in alameda. A couple of minutes in the morning. When you leave the posi tube because of the horseshoe, you'll save some time heading southbound on i-80, about 2 to 3 minutes as you head southbound on AT&T because of the fifth Street connection from that new exit from the Posey Tube. Next slide, please. Coming from WEBSTER You know, coming from downtown Oakland, it will be more direct. Save a couple of minutes there. For those of you who drive up the A380 freeway from the South Bay because of the removal of the Broadway off ramp and this is where I. Sort of miss characterize that video. The Broadway off ramp which is very long you get off the Broadway off ramp and it carries you on that elevated off ramp all the way to Broadway. And then you're forced through the Broadway intersection, which is really a very congested intersection. And by dropping that ramp and having you drop at Oak Street and come in through the Webster tube, there's a significant, you know, 4 to 6 minute savings. By 2045. It might be as much as 6 to 8 minutes savings because you don't have to circulate through the neighborhoods of Oakland to get to the website or to . Next slide, please. There's information about this project much more comprehensive than I just presented at the Web site shown here. There's also a public comment period that's going through November 30th on the draft, the air next slide. So we published a draft letter of support with suggestions for key considerations for the city of Alameda regarding the bridge regarding Oakland support. We the basic the draft letter that we presented the transportation can commission on October 28th recommended support for the project with with three conditions one or two conditions. One was that Oakland support the project. If Oakland didn't want to do it, then you know our support, then we wouldn't pursue it. But if Oakland felt it was important for Oakland, then we would we would stand by Oakland and support the project and that there. The second condition was that there be a commitment towards the next planning steps by the army, the county transportation commission to the bicycle pedestrian bridge. The Transportation Commission made a couple of changes to the letter. They requested that we add a comment about further transit enhancements to improve transit access through the tube system in the next phases of the design process. And we had even offered that we give up the Webster walkway because we didn't feel it was in our draft letter . We didn't feel that it was very important or would really benefit by pedestrians. And the Transportation Commission felt that, well, we don't give that up so quickly. That's that Webster walkway, although probably not well used in the future, is certainly a slight by adding it. It's a it's a net gain for bikes and pedestrians, at least some. So they made those two suggestions. Next slide. Since we drafted that letter, a number of things have happened. The City of Oakland administrator issued a letter in support of the Oakland Alameda Access Project. So we now know that Oakland is in support. So we think we should revise the letter. We don't think that needs to be a condition anymore. We've also received a letter yesterday from the Army to County Transportation Commission executive director talking about their support and a willingness to assist us with the next steps in the bicycle pedestrian bridge process. So we have transmitted those letters to the council tonight, earlier this afternoon, and we have revised the letter we've revised it to because we don't necessarily need this. The conditions about the Oakland of the Oakland support and we have revised the letter and to continue our support for the project with the understanding that the Army County Transportation Commission will continue to support our effort and Oakland is going to continue to support the effort to to build the bicycle pedestrian bridge. And we think ultimately with the Oakland Army Access Project, Oakland Alameda Access Project constructed and the bike bridge constructed, we will have achieved everything that we were trying to do to improve transportation connections, achieve significant mode, shift reduce traffic, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and just improve the quality of life both in Oakland and Alameda and in the region. So we have prepared that draft support letter for your consideration tonight and it was distributed to all of you earlier this evening. I think that's the last slide. So with that, I'm available myself and Rochelle are able to answer any questions. And I know the County Transportation Commission staff is here as well. Executive Director of van Gelder. Do you want to say anything at this point or do you want to? Oh, I'm sorry. I'll turn it over to you. I think you'll see me smiling, waving and laughing because we have some really cute little kids. I mean, it's nice that all your council members are cute, but the little boys on this on this meeting are adorable. So council, I think what I would suggest if you're amenable is that we hear some brief remarks from Miss Mojo , the executive director of A.C.T., who can also answer any clarifying questions you might have. And then we'll hear your clarifying questions. And actually, you can ask a few questions of any of the numerous staff members who are here this evening. And then we will go to our of our public speakers. So why don't we start with this CTC director test myself? Do you want to make some remarks? Nice to see you again. Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, councilmembers. It's nice to see all of you. And thank you for having this item before you tonight. I just want to start off by saying that Alameda City has long supported transportation improvement efforts in the city of Alameda. I want to note that just since 2016, there have been about $35.6 million that the city that Alameda City has awarded to the city for funding the ferry, terminal trails and several complete streets projects, and specifically for this estuary crossing. And Alameda, CTSI has supported $100,000 feasibility study back in 2009, about 275,000 for the 2019 feasibility study. And just this Thursday, the commission is poised to include two acts. They haven't acted yet, but they're poised to include the Westin Project, which is the estuary crossing in our long range countywide transportation plan. So I want to thank you all for working so closely with us and the city of Oakland on this. Oakland, Alameda, accept this project. In the letter that I did submit yesterday and and have had some very good conversations with the mayor, I did indicate to Pathways that my commission, the Alameda CTC, could consider for future funding for the estuary crossing bridge. And those are articulated in the letter. And we certainly look forward to working with your staff on how we can help technically to support moving the project forward. So I just want to thank you for your support of allowing me to access project. And we have long supported the work of the city of Alameda, and I'm certainly happy to answer any questions that any of you have tonight. Thank you. Thank you very much. Just for clarification, what's coming before the commission this Thursday is to include the Western Crossing in the 2020 county wide transportation plan for the ten year comprehensive investment plan, because there was both the ten year and the 30 year. But we asked that. That's correct. This western crossing be moved from 30 year horizon to ten years. Thank you. And yes, I think your letter lays out the of the other routes that we've we've discussed our with Mr. Chavez and and and John Batters Emeryville Councilmember, who's the vice chair of the Alameda County Transportation Commission and a big supporter of our proposal, was also in on this conversation on council clarifying questions about either the staff reporter any of the correspondents before you kill somebody. Thank you. Thanks for that presentation. Quick question, this ten year cap list, I mean, what does that get us? And then I have a follow up. Depending on the answer. Thank you. Councilmember Odie, I'll go ahead. Unless city staff, you want to answer that, but I know you're. The perfect person to answer that. Thank you, Councilmember. So Alameda City is one of our responsibilities is to develop the long range county wide transportation plan. That county wide transportation plan feeds into the regional transportation plan. And a project has to be in the regional transportation plan to receive state or federal funds. For our long range countywide transportation plan. We require that projects that come through our comprehensive investment plan for funding need to be listed in the countywide transportation plan. So it is really a pathway to allow projects to be able to move forward from a funding perspective. Okay. So I guess my follow up would be, I think you kind of answered it and thank you for that answer. I mean, there's no guarantee of funding by moving it from the 30 year plan to the ten year plan. Right. I think that was the kind of the intention of the original two letters was to get some commitment and funding but. I'm not hearing a commitment on funding. That's correct. This the county, right? Excuse me. The county transportation plan is not a programing document. It's basically a document that enables you to pursue funding. What these normal county long range countywide transportation plans basically compile projects that are of interest and importance to cities, the transit operators throughout Alameda County. What we've done that's different this year is we worked with our city and transit operators to identify what do you really think that you can accomplish in the next ten years in terms of your priorities? And so we we we established this ten year priority list based upon the priorities from our local jurisdictions as this list that we're really trying to accomplish within the next ten years. And that's based upon project readiness and the ability to be funded. And so we worked with all cities to identify. What they thought would be in the 30 or less, what they thought would be in the ten year list. And so your project going before the commission is on the ten year list. There would need to be just a final. Excuse me for interrupting, but a final note is that any funding for the project would have to come as a very specific action to the full commission. We as staff obviously are not able to commit any funding, but any funding actions would have to go through the full commission. Okay. Thank you. One last thing and I haven't seen you since you saw your new job, so belated congrats on that. Thank you. I think as long as we're talking about funding this budget and it with reference to at least in my first draft letter, that should still in the second one. But this 2014 letter, that is an exhibit, it's one of the exhibits to this particular staff for. Do you want to just touch on that and how that may factor in? Yeah, just a little bit of history, which forgive me if you already know all of this, but when. The public the public is listening in. So you're you're helping with speed. This is great. So when the county what when be back in 2014, the Alameda County Transportation Commission developed a county wide transportation plan to go before voters to seek their approval of a half cent transportation sales tax augmentation and extension. And we were going to each of the cities throughout Alameda County to seek their support. There were discussions at that time with the city of Alameda at wanting to make sure that there was enough in that plan that could really support the needs of the city of Alameda. And because, as Andrew Thomas has talked about, this, what used to be called the Broadway Jackson Project had been going on for so long, the city wanted to make sure that they had some assurances that if the project did not move forward, that there could be funding that could support the multi-modal access that's needed to the city. And so the chair and the vice chair at that time wrote a letter saying that if the project becomes infeasible, then the commission could consider programing money to the city. And so in my letter to you yesterday to the mayor, I noted that there are two pathways for the city to pursue funding. One is to go through our application process for discretionary funding, which is called our CIPA Comprehensive Investment Plan, and we're doing a call for projects in December. The second pathway is to come to the Commission and ask for consideration of that 2014 letter and for any consideration of funding through that venue. So those are two pathways that are before the city to come forward to have the Alameda CTC consider funding for the asteroid project. Thank you for the clarification questions council. That's where they suck. Yes. This is for our staff on the presentation particularly, particularly on page eight, the PDF Page eight. There is a construction phasing, kind of a just in case there's a shortfall. How funding? What kind of priorities would occur? My question is within Phase A, which is referred to as core project, which amounts to $68.2 million. Is the horseshoe coming out of posi tube? And is the improvements that lead up to evening commuters coming into Webster Tube? Are all of those projects within the core project a $68.2 million? My understanding is the horseshoe and the the dropping of the Broadway off ramp are both in the core project, and I'm seeing some heads nodding in the affirmative. So I think I'm right about that. Okay, wonderful. Thank you. Okay. That's my. Birthday. So I've got it. I've got, I guess, a technical question. And then I want to go back and ask a couple of questions about the funding. The technical question is because I don't think I heard it and I'm sorry if I missed it. Enter in your presentation at one point in time that the Horseshoe was going to result in a slowdown of actual speed limit in the tube. Is that still a part of this project? I it. Rodney, do you? I see, Rodney said, going up and down. I'm going to ask Rodney if he can help me answer that question. I believe the answer is. I believe the answer is yes. Rodney, am I right about that? Yeah, definitely a key consideration because of the the geometry of the horseshoe is that we needed to slow traffic down to 20 miles an hour by the time they reached the first curve. And so in order to do that, we'll be reducing the speed limit in the in the tubes to 35 miles an hour and then a thousand feet before the end of the tube will be reducing speeds down to 25 miles an hour, which is a normal city street speed limit. And then 20 miles an hour right at the at the first curve of the horseshoe, this was a big controversy. And then also a consensus point with Caltrans was to make sure that the horseshoe was safe. And so reducing the speed limit was a key component of that. So we'll be you know, we'll be looking at adding changeable message signs and other it's elements to help motorists know that they need to slow down by the time they negotiate the horseshoe. Also, what we'll be doing is is is narrowing the lanes inside the tubes to 11 feet to to employ traffic, calming measures to try to slow down vehicles as well. So through all these different measures, you know, we'll be trying to slow down cars and then making the the the drive to the horseshoe as safe as possible. Right. Thank you. Thank you. Very helpful. And I guess and I'm not sure who the quite I'll ask you the question, I guess, about funding and perhaps staff is the right one. But so we've been talking in our in our community members have been talking about the need for a real true multimodal access for for for many decades and for many, many years on this project. And, you know, I just learned about your you're the new letter about it 20 minutes ago. So before I came into the meeting, not realizing that there was a there was a new revised letter. And you'll recall that I texted you earlier today, but we weren't able to discuss this item. I understand you. Would I would have given you a heads up. That's unfortunate. So I guess my question is, given that so far, I'm a little concerned that I'm hearing that there are no actual commitments to fund the next steps of this project, that we're going to put it in the CIP so that it can be, you know, available for future funding and but no action. I guess. My my concern is no action has been taken on our past kind of requests to try to get here up until this point. And so I guess what from your standpoint with the new letter, what commitments are we getting besides consideration to put it into a sip that will then allow us to someday apply for funding? Is there a broader I mean, are you hearing from your members on the committee that they're going to turn around and say, yes, that the money for the PSR in the air is is an easy go? Well, I don't want to speak too much for my fellow commissioners, but I think it would be safe to say that I have some really good solid support, including from our to Oakland councilmembers. Every city in the county has a council, a representative from the council on the Alameda County Transportation Commission. But the city of Oakland, because it is so large, has to. And I certainly spent a fair amount of time talking with my colleagues from Oakland. But others, we have good support on the commission. And so when and again, you know, you never guarantee a vote. But when I asked at my policy committee meeting last week to move our Western policy project from the 30 year city where it had been assigned to the tenure and explained why this was so important not just to Alameda and Oakland, but also to the region, because it isn't stated in the letter. What our ultimate goal really has to be is to reduce the number of automobiles, especially single use automobiles on our roadways. And I am happy to say that my policy committee from across the county and different agencies and county supervisors voted unanimously that they thought that was the right decision. And and so what I also would say in a conversation this afternoon and this, Michel, if you wanted to just chime in about the next steps, because we are looking at action items both coming up in our well, let's see for our December. The commission doesn't meet in December as a full board, but in January of 2021, we're looking at a couple of action items. So if you want to. So thank you may I could just say at a staff little level excuse me to respond to Commissioner Erskine me councilman or not musselwhite's comment about vice mayor excuse me. Comment or question about a commitment of funding. That has to that is an item that has to go before the full commission. And that is not something that staff is able to provide that commitment, because ultimately we are not the ones that are assigned the full responsibility for programing and allocating the Measure B funds. So what we're looking at is if we get a letter from from the city regarding the interest to have the Commission take a look at the 2014 letter and consider that I commit that we can bring that to the first meetings in January. We have one commission meeting in December. It's on December 3rd, and they don't we don't have committee meetings for that meeting. So the first realistic time with this could come forward if we received that request from the city would be in January. And the first committee meetings that we have in January are on January 11th. So if that's the case, then we'd certainly want to set up times to meet with the city and talk with the city about approaches moving forward with this. And so the moment I get that letter, I'm ready to to set up some meetings. I'd like to set up some meetings with the mayor and and with with staff. I'm imagining Andrew Thomas would be there and perhaps whoever else from the city is appropriate, maybe Michel as well, to have a chance to sit with my staff and to come up with an approach for how we bring this to the commission in January for consideration. The other thing I wanted to note is the CIP, which is our competitive call for projects, will be released and opened in December, and that's another opportunity for the city to pursue discretionary funding for bicycle and pedestrian facilities through our comprehensive investment plan. So I laid out two pathways for the city to be able to pursue funds, and those are both available to the city. But ultimately it's the commission as an entire commission that would need to act on any sort of programing, funding and programing action. Thank you, Mr. Dillon and Vice Mayor, just to go back to your question, I don't recall that and someone can correct me if I'm wrong that we have actually brought forth a proposal other than the funding we've gotten thus far, and we have gotten funding for early in the early phases of this bridge design and study, but there hasn't been anything since then that we've asked for and been turned down by actually bringing it to the commission. This letter, the draft letter is is a letter and it serves different purposes. But to actually get the technical funding there, to actually get the funding commitments, we do need to go to the full commission and it would first come through our policy committee, says Ms.. Fischel noted. And then the other thing I'll say is we all agree that we do need to work really carefully or not carefully, but just deliberately on communication, because we realized in in finally having a chance to sit down with the executive director, with the Vice Chair of the commission and some of our staff, that that is what you see. Staff wasn't aware of the extent to which we have engaged with the Coast Guard and that and I guess I'm just privileged to work with such smart, knowledgeable, talented people. And Andrew Thomas, Michelle Wheeler, Rodney Pimentel has been awesome and he speaks that language. So he has been able to work. I think he's been doing this with the Coast Guard a year or more, maybe to make sure that the bridge design standards were compliant with the Coast Guard standards. And so but DC wasn't aware of the extent of that. And we are expecting a letter from the Coast Guard soon, tomorrow. So anyway, I that's a that's a really long winded answer to your question, but I think that there is, as Ms.. Michelle said, there is a path forward to getting funding. And I do feel that we have good support from the Commission. Did I get through the questions before I got to Councilmember. Councilmember Vela. I see. Thank you. And my my question is really, you know, is, are the policy committees or we just went through the process, but is there going to be or are we hopeful that there will be a recommendation of support? Do you do those committees from those committees? Is that what I'm reading into this? I would say yes. Did you want to. Hear a thank you, Mayor? Yes. The way that the committees work at Alameda City is that they are recommending committees are subcommittees of the full board. The board is made up of 22 elected officials in Alameda County and the committees hear items and then they make recommendations to the full commission. And so essentially for it to go to the full commission after going from the committees, it would be going with some sort of recommendation, correct? Yes. Just to spell it out for members of the Bloc. Yes, exactly. And and you can be sure that I'm lobbying my committee and and we all stay in touch. I mean, these are the representatives of our 14 cities, all of our county supervisors and then the representatives of our transit agencies. So, yes. Thank you. Okay. Any further clarifying questions, Kels, over this? This is a quick. Question for staff need to check. So when the traffic comes out of the posi tube, can we still go up to the Chinese garden park and then make a left there on that seventh street? I forgot. Or a street. And can we make it? Can we make a left like we do now? Granted, it won't be. It'll be at a at a. Angle. It won't be that nice. Smooth left. Can we still make a left? Left and then? And then onto Jackson. Figure out a way to then get on to the. In other words, not take the do not take the horseshoe. If that's still an option, even if we have to do a hard left. Hard left. It's all right. Hard right? Yeah, exactly. Sorry about that. Hard right. Hard right. Yeah. That will still be an option. It just won't be as big as you said because of the changes to improve bicycle pedestrian access. It won't be as as as as fast as it might have been in the past. Mm hmm. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. Any. I can't. Everybody. Yeah, I'm just. I mean, without commenting on the substance, because that'll be for later. But I'm just curious on the process because, you know, we had a letter that I first read about in the newspaper, and then it went to the Transportation Commission where there was a public hearing and they made modifications to it. And then it was agenda is on this agenda with a chance for the council to review and then an hour and a half before the meeting without any council input and apparently some discussions that none of us were party to or didn't even know were going on happened. And then now we have another revised letter that the public hasn't received. So, I mean, maybe I'm missing something in the process, but it seems to me that, again, that I don't want to talk about, you know, what the letter has in it, but it just seems to be like a nontransparent process. So can we can someone kind of. Walk me. Through, you know, what conversations were had and what promises were made? You know, how we got to a point where the verbiage was changed and I mean, it just I'm a little bit baffled. Sure. I will be happy to take that, because Andrew Thomas asked me, do you want to just go forward with the letter that's out there and have everybody kind of wordsmith it tonight? And I said, what I would rather do is get the letter into the council packet. And it did go in. But you have to know and refresh your your packet and all that that because I wanted the public to see it, to be able to follow along in real time, I wanted the council to be able to see it and the the changes that came about. And it wasn't a matter of trying to not be transparent because that's not my style. But we got an urgent request yesterday morning that, you know, there's some some serious concerns about a couple of things in this letter. And one of them was that we seem to be asking the commission to to guarantee funding, which is, as Ms.. Michelle explained, is not the way that process works. And we were also suggesting that now maybe County Transportation Commission be the lead the lead agency on this on the estuary crossing project for a number of reasons, because there's also federal approvals that have to take place. That was not necessarily something that could be done, but it just it wasn't the best place to state that. And we already had gotten and Mr. Thomas was able to get the support from the city of Oakland by way of this letter from the city administrator. So we didn't need to have that in there as a condition. I mean, we could have just probably done all the wordsmithing now and in a sense we will be. But I wanted to get the letters out into the packet for the Council and the rest of the public, and I'm sorry that some of you didn't see it sooner, but that's that's what it is. And that was why I earlier alluded to that, that we have discovered that we need to do more and better communication, because it would definitely have been preferable. When my draft letter first came out and got picked up by blogs and on the, you know, on the front page of one of our local newspapers, and it caused a lot of consternation. And I wasn't sure that everybody had actually read the whole thing, but there were some technical points, the ones that I pointed out, that did need to be corrected for it to be a more accurate letter. I guess my concern was, I mean, I got the email from Laura with the attachments, so I was able to read it before and without getting into the merits of the changes, I mean, whether they're valid concerns raised yesterday or not, I mean, I think those are concerns that should have come to the Council for a policy decision and not just unilaterally had a change in the letter, because many people in the community have raised a lot of. Concerns and correspondence to us. And I mean, personally, I think it should be our our position and our role to evaluate those concerns that I'm sure the seven people or more are going to raise and, you know, come to a decision together. You know, again, I'll have my comments on the substance later. But, you know, I, I just the process on this. I'm not I'm just not sure it is follows that this letter in the spirit of our sunshine ordinance. Well we certainly could have then I guess agenda is this for a continued it to another time and taken a little more time. I'm kind of playing Beat the Clock because I really would like to get this back to the County Transportation Commission in time for the December Policy Committee meetings. In the January full commission meeting that we are going to have we are going to have a discussion after we've heard our public comment. And I appreciate hearing. I mean, it's just, you know, there's five of us here and we all should have it have a say in that. That's my only point. And I think we're perfectly capable of doing that in meeting the November 30th deadline with this agenda item. Right. Thank you. Any further comments? Okay. Let's go to public comment then. And so how many public speakers do we have now? We now have 12. Okay. So and each speaker will then get 2 minutes and. And we're now up to 15. Okay. So more people are seven. First one is Michael Mooney. And I'm just going to say really quickly that the speakers, you know, you certainly can have your 2 minutes, but you should not feel the need to repeat exactly what the previous speaker said. But with that, we are happy to hear our first comment. So, Mr. Mayor. Well, Mayor. Vice Mayor and city council members, I will make this quick. I am a past president of OCA East Bay, so we work a lot with Oakland, Chinatown, and I'm also a 40 year Alameda resident, so I've been here for a while, grew up here in Alameda. I'm talking to you guys about this as an Alameda resident. This is something. Okay. And I think this is a great project on my in support of the project. I think it's definitely after hearing everything that's been going on, you know, being in Alameda and being in Alameda for so long, it is something that is definitely overdue . You know, we're not living like we were 40 years ago where you could actually have where the tunnel is and kind of be able to go through it and be on the freeway and be in San Francisco in like 15 minutes. We can't do that anymore. So any time saved, any time going around makes it a lot easier. Plus, also working in Chinatown and doing to Oakland, Chinatown, Pick It Up program. We see a lot of the trash and a lot of the pollution and all the other stuff that goes along on the walls. And so we feel, you know, I think that that would definitely help out in Oakland, Chinatown site. So excuse me, I'm sick. So but I just wanted to let you know that I'm in support of this. And also if we we do start doing the the the bridge, I think we should also think about motorized skateboards or one wheel ease or, you know, put. Personal vehicles are personal motorized devices that are electronic or electric to be able to go through the bridge area. Sorry about that. I'm still sick. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Man. I hope you feel better soon. All right. Next speaker. Sabrina Chen. Good evening, Mr. Chen. I have to unmute which I needed. People don't appreciate, but. But here I am. Good evening. My name is Sabrina Chen. I've lived here for 23 years, and prior to that, I spent over two decades helping build the social service infrastructure in Oakland, Chinatown. So the reason why we have Asian health services, the Culture Center and all these other things, I, I was I'm very proud to say I had a little hand in it or a fist or something. But to to see Chinatown in the past 11 years has been devastating for me. With all of the protests that overflowed into Chinatown, businesses had to close early on weekends and evenings. And, you know, with the with the pandemic and all of the anti-Asian sentiment, it's really suffered a great deal and it's suffered it's been suffering ever since it was established. So the freeway itself destroyed 2000 units of housing, and almost all of the residential in the original Oakland, Chinatown have been destroyed. So when I saw this project, I was really excited to see that traffic would no longer cut right through Chinatown, where we live, our lovely Alameda with the beautiful streets and the trees one mile through the tube. And then you see this, this trash in Chinatown. So I really wanted to see this project go forward. And I'm I'm actually glad the letter was changed. And I will harness all forces to support the bridge, the pedestrian bridge, because it will help all of us. Thank you. You're. You're muted, mayor now. I'm still learning. Thank you, Miss Chen. And I hope Miss Chen read in a very moving letter to, I think it was the whole council. I hope everyone got that. Yes, I think they did. Good. Okay. Next speaker. Doris G. Good evening, Mr. G. And we should go ahead and mute. There you go. Great. Thank you. Good evening. Here is the Ashcraft vice mayor Knox White City Council staff and a city commission. My name is Doris G. And I live in the city of Alameda. I'm an active community member in the city of Alameda and in Oakland, Chinatown. I've been a commuter from the Alameda Tube to my job on Oakland's Pill Hill for more than 35 years. I'm glad the problem is being addressed now with forethought because the traffic can only get worse. I watched the Oakland Alameda Access Project video, which was shown tonight no less than ten times because this is a very complicated plan with lots of moving parts and I appreciate all the changes that will happen. One of the treasures in Oakland. Chinatown, is the. Chinese Garden Park that is underutilized due to traffic. Our family had to cross Seventh and Harrison to visit the Chinese Garden Park. Even with the light, there was a lot of traffic and we were not sure that cars would stop. I cannot imagine anyone who was a senior with disabilities having to negotiate that crossing. With more traffic surrounding the garden park. It makes it very difficult. The park is isolated from the rest of Chinatown due to so much traffic separating it from the community. Removing the Broadway offramp from the 880 North will hopefully create more tourist opportunities and. A symbiotic relationship between. Jack London and Chinatown businesses. My favorite change is thinking. Outside the box by creating Alameda only exit out of the Alameda Tube to ease traffic. Getting onto the freeway exchanges. Although the not perfect conditions for biking through the Alameda Tube, I think it's time for us to move forward with this project. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Next Speaker. Susie Hofstetter. The evening. We have dinner that evening. Mayor and Council. My name is Susie Hofstetter. I'm advocacy manager with East Bay. Firstly, I want to thank staff, counsel and all the consultant teams and staff, all me, the city for your hard work on this project over many years. I'd like to say that it does support the project specifically for its safety benefits to Oakland, Chinatown, and we stand in solidarity with the Oakland Chinatown community and their needs for justice and in this traffic safety condition. However, we still have serious concerns about the failure of this project to provide true multimodal access across the estuary. And we've heard a lot of discussion about this this evening. And when we talk about the future of the bicycle pedestrian bridge. The question for both staff of the city and for the CDC and elected officials is what if the bike ped bridge does not secure any additional funding through the city or from the commission? In January and the Oakland Limited Access Project continues to move forward with no meaningful multimodal access across the estuary. If this occurs, what is the implication here for the city's commitment to multimodal projects as promised to voters? So we fully understand that our city staff can't commit funding for a separate project without support from the Commission. So what we do need to see is support and commitment from leadership, staff, leadership to partner with the city to present this project in a way to the commission that will earn that success and that will show true partnership. And if it's if it's totally neutral and it's just the city asking for this support from the full commission will be very difficult position for us. So that's what we're hoping for, to see true commitment and a presentation that presents the purpose and the need, the way that you would for a project of regional significance for any other mode. So that's what I'd like to ask for now. Thank you, Mr. Next Speaker. Denise Champion, you. Evening, Mr. Penny. Hi. Thank you. I appreciate the time and your attention. Mayor, vice mayor and council members and staff. I guess I want to start off by, first of all, thanking staff for their work on this. I was. I'll admit I was a little taken aback by the change in the letter today. We had worked very hard with staff on the original draft, so I apologize if I'm sounding a little flustered tonight. But my main the main point I want to make is that the the critical point of staff's original letter was that it conditioned our support on unidentified committing funded sources for the next two phases of the bridge . I'm just really concerned that we're settling essentially for supporting this project in exchange for a promise that this is going to be added to the ten year plan. But with really, as soon as you just said no committed, identified funding, I'm also a little surprised to hear that people think that this is a new ask. We have been saying since day one that opening up the Webster tube path will not make this project multimodal. And so we were excited that staff was. Basically kind of holding the line on this project, being multimodal and requesting funding to study a true multimodal solution. So, I mean, I'm just concerned this is our one chance to really hold a city six feet to the fire in terms of delivering a multimodal solution, which is what the voters wanted. So I think we have a responsibility to deliver what the voters said they wanted and not not give away that funding for another car project without any commitment to any type of multimodal solution for for all meetings. So anyway, thank you for your time and thanks for the work everyone's done on this. I know things have been really fast and I appreciate everyone's attention. Thank you, Mr. Premier. And next Speaker Cierto Tolani. Good evening. And you just need to unmute. Yeah. Good evening. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Good evening, Mayor. And. And Council members. My name is Sue Gilani. I'm representing Oakland, Chinatown Chamber. I'm a board member and also past president. Interestingly, I also resident, Alameda resident, 20 years living in Alameda. So I live alameda and work for Oakland, Chinatown. I also work in Oakland. Chinatown is my community and for many, many years, Chinatown has been taking the brunt of the Alameda traffic. And and I think the speaker earlier talk about a Chinese garden it wasn't belonged in a community but unfortunately cannot be used by our residents because of the unsafe condition and the the senior resident and the kids. So this project came along and I was involved. Earlier in the as early as 20 call Broadway Jackson and. I was heavily involved in that and we were supporting the project and we still support this project. So we hope the city of Alameda will approve this project because it's good not only for Oakland, Chinatown, but also it's good for City of Alameda in particular. With all the development that we have in the Alameda points with many cars, that is going to be coming. So my goal is that I'm hoping. This. Project will alleviate some of the traffic issues that our community is facing and it makes some improvement. And and it's really a benefit to our community. And we asked the mayor and council to approve this project. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Lundy. Our next speaker. Indeed, Johnson. It is Johnson. It needed me again. Evening. Good evening, Mayor Ashcraft. Council members and staff. I'm a longtime resident of Alameda, a board member of Bike Walk Alameda, and someone who travels this project area frequently to my job in Oakland. I support the city's recommendation on outcomes described in its original letter or a version of the letter posted just tonight. If it can be refined further to ensure funding promised will be funding delivered. Life is a good project, but we really. Need to the project to fulfill. Its multimodal promise to users, bikers and walkers who have been woefully. Underserved for years in this. Area. The walkway, isn't it? It advancing a transformational. Project like the bike and pedestrian bridge is the city's. Revised. Letter seems like the right direction in identifying this issue and steering the bridge into the countywide plan in its ten year priority project priority list. And we celebrate that. That progress now seems dependent on votes and applications that may be denied. Having to go through the CIP process to compete with other projects for funding feels like a step backwards from where we are now going. To the full commission with the 2014 letter, with letters of recommendation. As. Proposed, seems somewhat more promising, but still iffy. Bottom line, we'd like to see the cities led refined further. So funding is committed with greater certainty. Transportation funding is extremely competitive, and we already voted for this. The money that's needed for the next set of studies is sitting in the Webster Tube walkway, which is a truly modern enhancement anyway. Alamy this partnership on Iraq deserves at least this kind of commitment from AC DC. Thank you for your negative. The city leadership and staff for their hard work on this. It's a really important project and it can be transformational for both of our both sides of the story and for the larger region. Really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you, Ms.. Chancellor and Speaker. Zack BOLLING. In the Mr. BOLLING. Evening. Yeah, I wanted to throw my support behind the original draft of the letter. I think I agree with the comments from the earlier speakers that we should probably consider conditioning our support on having commitment to a pedestrian bridge. I think there was two online petitions and one of them I think was like over 550 people. The other one had an almost 1500 people from our community that were behind having a pedestrian bridge. I think this project is really vital and we should move forward as soon as possible. But we really do need a better solution for pedestrian and bike access to the across the estuary than that small sidewalk. Is anyone that's ever taken that sidewalk through the tube as it is today is a terrible experience and not something we can consider a viable option. And I will leave it at that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. BOLLING. Our next speaker. Will see Geely. If you've never seen me. Hi. Hi. As you know, I'm founder of Bike Walk Alameda, and I've been involved with this project since the beginning from the Alameda. County. Transportation Commission Bicycle Pedestrian Advisory Committee to the most recent app subcommittee. I've organized bike headcounts of the posi tube and spoken to many reluctant users of the posi path. And I urge you to a ject to the. Webster Bike Path. Inclusion. The city has rejected this solution since the 2009 estuary crossing study, and I respectfully take exception to Andrew's comments that it's a net gain. There is no data to indicate that adding a new path, a path that's exactly like the current posi tube would gain any. New. Users, not even one new user. The path would be a waste of millions of taxpayer dollars and. Frankly create an. Embarrassment. I urge you to reject the Webster too path and find a way. Please find a way to include a meaningful, multi-modal solution. Thank you. Thank you, Jerry. Our next speaker. At Tommaso Bhujia. An evening. That evening. Mayor Council members, regional agency staff my name is Musubi and I'm a resident in Jack London where our air quality in London and West Oakland is some of the worst in the region because of the heavy traffic on a. We're in the midst of a climate crisis that demanded bold infrastructure changes two decades ago. We've known about this for two decades at least, that we could have done something about the fact that we're still talking about how to make it easier for people to drive cars. One of the largest contributors to the climate crisis, that is unconscionable. The project is not yet fully funded, and any fundraising with the aim of making it easier to drive is akin to climate denial. It is denying warnings from scientists that cars are one of the region's most significant contributors to the climate crisis. If you're thinking about electric cars, let me encourage you to listen to. Scientists were warning that a 1. To 1 replacement of internal combustion to electric cars would not allow us to meet our our mitigation. Goals, our climate mitigation goals. And the still significant impacts of local air quality of electric cars. I'm not in my way saying they're the same, but they still contribute to bad local air quality. If this. Project will. Increase car trips, it is a contributor to the climate crisis. I urge the Council and regional agencies to reprioritize infrastructure projects. To give people. Realistic options so they don't. Have to drive everywhere as they do now. We reduce traffic in Chinatown and make it safer. For pedestrians and bikers in Oakland by reducing almeida's need to drive everywhere. We are the victims of your commuting choices and of your infrastructure choice. Thank you so much. Thank you for your comments, Mr. Vijay. Our next speaker. Jim Strelow. Good evening, Mr. Stringer. That evening, Mayor, Council, AC, DC Staff and Ali. I am a native Alameddine voter, a bicyclist. I have ridden my bicycle in the Posey Tube walkway four times a month pre-COVID, and now once a month. The new Webster Street Tube bicycle pedestrian lane is needed and will be used. Alameda should request Caltrans maintenance monthly cleaning of the walls and for the project to improve upgrade the air circulation technology of both tubes. As a bicyclist, I fully support the current multi-modal OCA project. I have commented on this project for years. Good work AC DC. You would have much more favorable citizen opinions if you promoted another vehicle bridge access on and off the island. Spending so much money only for a bike ped bridge is the flaw in your suit. There are probably only one hundreds of citizens in favor and probably tens of thousands of maidens against a bike ped only bridge. AC DC do not be snowed by the council's eagerness for that project. Alameda should be promoting multi-modal solutions and not a one sided bike pad myopic view of the world and that spending of taxpayer money . I fail to see how thousands would daily use some future bike ped bridge. It is excessive hyperbola. This council is promoting an expensive non multi-modal bike ped bridge project. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Strelow. Our next speaker. Michael Sullivan. Evening, Mr. Sullivan. Good evening, Mayor. Council and staff. My name is Michael Sullivan, and I'm one of the few people who pre-COVID biked through the tube on a nearly daily basis, going from Alameda to Amtrak and Jacqueline Square. I only tolerate biking because I value the freedom of being able to control my own schedule. And I don't want to be tied to the bus timing and I prefer not having to bike all the way to Park Street Bridge and back to Jacqueline. Is where I ride rain or shine and want. To take the quickest path. Quickest path, especially in the winter. A second path won't improve the overall experience at all. It's just a second bad option. The extra foot width of width in the. Second path won't improve the experience. And with the pass being one way, you'll still have to use the existing narrow path on one of the trips, so it'll always be a bad experience. Also, another. Issue with the one way path, which I haven't heard articulated. Yet. When you have fast traveling bicyclists and slow traveling walkers going through the tube at the same time, the bicyclists will overtake the walkers if you're traveling in opposite directions, which happens half the time on a two way path. Bicyclists approach the walkers from the front, and it's easy to see the walker get the walkers attention and to negotiate passing when going the same direction, which would be 100% of the time on a one way path. The bicyclists are approaching the walkers from the back. People often wear headphones due to the noise and. It can be very difficult to get the walkers attention. Many times I've scared walkers. Trying to make them aware that I'm behind them. In the video we saw earlier, you'll see multiple bicyclists and walkers together on the path. So next time you watch it, focus on the walkers and bikers. It really illustrates how the bicyclists are going to have to have multiple conflicts as they approach each walker from behind. And I expect that the walkers will start. Continually looking over their shoulders, worried that some devices will come behind them, so it'll make a bad experience for them also. The goal of these improvements is to increase the number of people biking and walking through the tubes. And although it's unlikely if it did happen, this will just increase these conflicts. I feel that it'd be unfortunate to spend any valuable bike and pedestrian funds on the second path in a tube. This is definitely not a multimodal little project like it's supposed to be. I strongly support increase in investing funds. On a real solution. Thank you for your comments, Mr. Sullivan. Our next speaker. Doug Letterman. Good evening, Mr. Letterman. Thank you, Mayor. Council member. Staff. I mean, I'll meet a resident driver and also I ride a bike. I believe this project is designed almost exclusively for drivers of private automobiles, which is fine, but let's not pretend that it does anything for multimodal access or long term sustainability. The bike and pedestrian components of the plan are laughable and provided purely as a stop. On the Oakland side, it simply trades one dangerous traffic sewer for another. While it will reduce some pedestrian conflicts for freeway bound Alameda drivers. It will widen the street off ramp in order to funnel more open bound drivers onto Chinatown streets. The project will do nothing to further the city's goals at reducing automobile trips, greenhouse gas emissions and traffic, the more likely exacerbate them. So I believe Alameda has a tremendous opportunity to be a world leader in ending car dependance by encouraging more bicycle transit and pedestrian trips. The estuary bike pedestrian bridge is essential to this goal, and like several other speakers, I would urge Council to get its support for this bloated highway project on a firm commitment to fund the estuary, bike and pedestrian bridge. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Letterman. Next speaker. Dave Campbell. Good evening, Mr. Campbell. Dave Campbell, Advocacy Director with Vikings. Faye, I just want to add and I apologize missed the presentation was on another call. To the comments that have been made and particularly the comments of Susie Hofstetter from Viki say is that I just want to see Alameda, CTSI commit to funding this bridge, this bike, that bridge. And I haven't really had a chance to talk with Alameda City staff on the particulars of this one. But, you know, we have not heard clarity on can money from the OJP this project go to fund the studies, the air, the bike Ted Bridge I have heard yes I for no I don't think I have clarity and I've talked to so many people about this. I know Alameda City staff is on this call. Let's get clarity tonight. Can it happen? And if so, then your letters should say we support the project with the understanding that this bike Ted Bridge will be funded from the project. And if not, or maybe you put it the other way, you will. Alameda will apply for the CIP funding to fund the air to the bike bridge. We support this project with the understanding will apply for that money and if we get it great and if we don't, it is our understanding that the OJP project will fund this bike pit bridge. So that's all we want. I know Alameda County has the money. We fought hard with volunteers to get Measure B passed. I've seen Alameda and CTSI work out solutions for good projects and find the money. And I think what would bring all the parties together tonight? It would be to hear from alameda staff tonight. We are going to build you a bike. Ted bridge, if it's the last thing we do. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Campbell. Our next speaker. That was our last speaker. Okay. Okay. With that, I'm going to close public comment and I want to ask for some staff clarifications and a couple of things in broad strokes to Andrew Thomas. Can I ask you to address some of what we've heard from our speakers about urging the City Council to condition their support for the Oakland Alameda Access Project on getting funding for our estuary crossing? Could you take that? Absolutely. Madam Mayor. The we we prepared a first draft letter that many people referred to which conditioned our support on getting funding. And let's just make sure everybody understands. We never conditioned it on funding to build the bridge. We believe that building the bridge is a $200 million effort. We just were conditioning it on the next studies at about 5 million. So the bridge is a big effort. It's a huge project. It is a project that is going to require a huge lift from the entire region over many years. So this is a. Long road that we're that we are going to need to go down to get this bridge built and we're going to need regional support. Our first letter served a excellent purpose from our perspective, staff's perspective. It brought regional attention to this project. For the first time in many years, we were hearing from representatives from Oakland, from Emeryville, from Albany. People who represent their cities at the ACT board expressing their. Support for what we. Were trying to do. That is a major step forward because we're going to need their support for many years. We. From our perspective, we see two good projects here. We see the Oakland Alameda Access Project, and we see that as a good project for the reasons we talked about in the presentation. It is taking care of long standing problems in the Oakland and Chinatown area that were caused by the current design. We think that we've come up with a great solution to solve those problems and make life safer and better in the Oakland, Chinatown area. Does it solve the bicycle pedestrian access issues crossing the estuary? No, not by a long shot. And we are letter continues to make that statement loud and clear. A quick. Side note. Our first letter said, you know, and we don't care about that bike walkway at all. Like, if you want to take that money, that 7 million to put in that walkway and use that to fund the next step in the planning process, which we believe is around 5 to $6 million. We're okay with that. Just take that and fund the next step with that. That would be a simple solution to fixing this problem and getting us to the next step. It was the Alameda Transportation Commission who said, don't give that away so quick. STAFF We think it is a net gain. But just for the councils, from the council's perspective, that that's really something that as a policy call for you to make. So we have two projects, two good projects, one that solves problems in the Oakland Chinatown area that we think is super important. And then we have a second great project that we also need there in different stages of their development. Neither of. Them, though, are at the finish. Line. The Oakland Alameda Access Project is still short $33 million. The bike, pedestrian bridge. Short 200. Plus million dollars. The region is going to have to work together to get both of them built. And at this point in this process, holding the first one back. Until and unless we get the. 5 million to do the next step for the second project just didn't seem like the right regional strategy for Alameda to take was there. That's why the tone and the change in the letter which says we support the Oakland Alameda Access Project, we think it's a good project and we're doing it with the understanding because we believe it's good for the region. And we're doing it with the understanding the region supports us and is going to continue to support the city of Alameda on this second regional project. And that Alameda County, the Alameda County Transportation Commission, will continue to support both projects. That is our support and it's it's an and that and we and that is our statement of support for the Open Access project. And it's it's based on this understanding that the region also. Supports the bike bridge. So that's sort of how we see it and we don't see it in in our best interest. And if you're interested in continuing regional support. We're going to need to raise over $200 million over the upcoming years, you know, sort of obstructing or trying to slow down. Or or. Hold the one project back until this project, you know, tying them together seemed like we may be taking the wrong the wrong strategy there. Thank you, Mr. Thomas. And then I also wanted some clarification, and I think this would be from you, Mr. Joe. We heard Mr. Campbell of the Bicycle Coalition talking about why can't we use AP money to fund? And by the way, I'm just going to stop here for a minute. I see my time clock is running out. I am trying to see that questions are answered that were raised by our speakers. And I, I don't think I mean, will we get to council discussion? I will happily start counting my time. But if I'm going to give up all my time running this meeting, we're going to be taking a lot of roll call votes. Yeah. Okay. So are you asking for 9 minutes? Well, I'm asking why when I'm trying to get clarification questions answered. Sorry, I'm a little irritated a bit, but really? City attorney, city clerk. Help me out. Here. Well, after the last meeting, the city attorney and I discussed it. You know, he can weigh in, too, but basically, you know, the rules don't provide for a distinction, you know, as part of the staff presentation. And it came up under the council referral. And the thing was the council member presenting the referral is able to give a presentation and we decided to respond to questions as part of just a referral. But this is a staff brought item and there's no exception for this, we felt. Well, you know, I guess I could just turn to staff and say you were listening to all the questions that were asked. Would you please answer them? But this. Okay. Okay. I would like to ask that I be given a reset on my clock because I haven't even begun to discuss this with the council. But we need to do that by motion. That's why I move that. We have a motion by Councilmember de SAC. I'll second. Thank you. We have a statement by the vice mayor. May we have a roll call? Vote, please. Madam Clerk. Councilmember de Knox White. Hi, Odie. I avella high mayor as Ashcraft. I think that council. I appreciate that. Okay. I'm going to be very brief then. Next question. Answered Please by this one shell can Oakland Alameda Access Project Funding be used for the Estuary Crossing Bridge. So one of the options that I provided in my letter to you, Mayor, yesterday, and I'm not sure if that made it to the rest of the council, but there are two pathways. There's the CHP and then there is this model. Could you start with the threshold question? Yes, that money that's allocated for the Open Alameda Access Project. Can that be allocated to the estuary crossing bridge? That is something that has to be determined at the Alameda CTC for commission. That's not something that is staff. Like it possibly can be. So it possibly could be, yes. Continue. And in my letter that I mentioned, I was mentioning the two options that the city could move forward with. And in my second option, it was to bring forth the 2014 letter for consideration at Alameda CTC for funding for the they could consider funding for the estuary bridge. What I committed in that letter also was that if I received a letter from the city of Alameda in early December, that I could commit to bringing that in January to my commission. Yes. And you did see that earlier. And so to be clear, the many we are talking about, as referenced in that letter is 75 million, is that correct? The money that is in the expenditure plan and referenced in the letter is 75 million. The letter also noted that if the project became infeasible, then the commission would consider reallocation. So I think that that's going to be part of the discussion that is going to need to be addressed at the commission. But I think that there is a strong commitment to multi-modal access and improvements. And I think that the Commission I would expect the Commission to be very open to that for considering multimodal access. Is there any geographical limitation that comes into play? The environmental documents for the Oakland Alameda Access Project does not have the estuary crossing as part of its very specific project study area. The expenditure plan in and of itself, the 2014 expenditure plan did not have a very specific delineation. It was the formerly known the Broadway Jackson Project. But so that's the distinction that the transportation expenditure plan does not have a map specifically drawn for this project, whereas the environmental document for the Oakland Alameda Access Project does have a very specific delineation of the project for sequence study purposes. But with that intact funding. Andrew Thomas is shaking his head now. Do you want to chime in, Mr. Thomas? I mean, what the air delineates as the project area doesn't. I mean, the the air can't cover the bridge. That's clear. That's right. Okay. Um, I'm. Oh. Okay. Let's open it up to council discussion. Who wants to start? Pressman okay. At first I was going to ask if Tony was okay. I'm fine. My carriages went down and you didn't move. Your chair fell or, you. Know, my camera fell away. All right. But, sir, thank you. I'm going to I'm going to try to talk really quickly and I'm going to. Sorry. I'm sorry that I mean, of course, some folks is probably a little bit of history about this project that, you know, the history of this project is really the history of Alameda and Alameda staff in Alameda as commission members and counsel, really pushing this project forward and getting it to the place where we finally have Chinatown by and and coming to us and asking us to please support this. The horseshoe that was discussed was something that was raised by the Transportation Commission. Remember Robert McFarlane McFarland when this project first came before the Alligator Transportation Commission and he read it and he said, Why don't you look at our horseshoe? That's what we do. When we built freeways down in Texas for a number of years, the Transportation Commission in the City Council actually pushed our public works department to keep that option alive, as the project managers for this project continued to try to push it off because it was too difficult in getting Caltrans to say it would work. What's not possible? One of the voices who kept saying No, you can do this is now the project manager, Rodney Pimentel. So again, I just want to give some props, props there because really at the end of the day it is the horseshoe that makes this project even possibly worth consideration for me. I think this is a this is a difficult decision we have tonight only in that I do not believe we are delivering the project that the voters were presented with when we went to the voters. This is not across estuary Alameda Point Serving Multimodal Project. However, I do also agree with all of our our speakers from Alameda but who also have strong connections into Chinatown that the situation that's happening in Chinatown is just absolutely unacceptable. And we are it is our traffic that is impacting their community and we need to do something. So quite honestly, I came to this meeting with fully expecting to support the original letter because I believe that the original letter actually outlines a pathway for meeting not just the letter of doing a project, but also the spirit of what was presented to people from from the get go. I ask the question a little bit. I'm I guess if I have disappointment, it's that here we are at a meeting where we're being asked to now start a process for asking for funding for hours and hours when we have known for years that this was going to be needed and that the city had a strong connection between estuary crossing and the AP. And I'm not I'm quite honestly had a little bit of a loss for why we haven't been working. Why why this? Why, why? This recommendation didn't happen a year ago, and we didn't actually have hadn't already made some of these questions so that we can actually come in here and say, hey, we've already got the requirement to me. Well, you know, I also believe that we have good faith partners who are here advising us in good faith. And, you know, I want to I want to suggest or ask I guess it would be the question. I think one of our first speakers, Steve Hofstetter, made a suggestion. You know, I appreciate Ms.. Langella's commitment to accepting and moving forward. Anything but my my ask would be that actually I would want to see staff to actually make a recommendation, along with the city council, with the city of Alameda for this funding. I again, I understand that the staff cannot make a commitment to fund it, that that is on the on the commission, and that's a vote that happens. But I think it's I think it is a show of good faith that we understand that this is a priority and this is something that we have been talking about for many, many, many years. I mean, I can tell you about meetings I had at Asian Health Services back before 2010, talking about the need to link multimodal connections to reduce traffic through Chinatown. Back when we were trying to convince them that this project was even worth worth moving forward with. So for me, I'd like to see I'd like to add with that commitment, I could actually, you know, I would be happy to sign on to the new and improved letter, but I would like to have that commitment. And if not, then I think we need to have a little bit of a conversation about how what what are we going to do if the commission says, well, we don't really want to kind of honor those parts of the those commitments that we made to voters back in 2008. So I'll stop right there. I look forward to your. Thanks. Thank you, Councilmember Vella. But you know, I don't want to waste time repeating what the vice mayor as points were. But I think that to me, there's there's a few things here. I've heard from a lot of different community members with different viewpoints. I certainly think that we need to address Alameda Traffic's impacts to Oakland, Chinatown. And I think that that's a huge issue. And I think the fact that there is buy in from the Chinatown community as well as improvements to the project, is something that I am happy to, to see and to support. That said, I think my concern is this is all somewhat of a negotiation. And with supporting this project, we ultimately are losing our leverage to support what is deemed a separate project, or at least that's how it's feeling, I think, to some of our bike and multimodal transit advocates in that we are we are distinguishing the projects and we are then losing our ability to move forward with the other project. And I know that both are behind on and need more funding. I would echo device mayors asked to get a commitment from the staff to actually recommend support for the next step in the Alameda Estuary Crossing Bike PED Bridge. And I know we heard from a number of different speakers. I live on the West End. I go through the tube all the time for work. So does my partner. I lived in London. I biked and walked while I was there. The entire time I was there. Going through the tube is on bike is the worst experience I can possibly think of as a cyclist and as a parent to say that this we're going to build another walkway and don't worry you have bike ped access into Oakland from west Alameda is a complete farce because there is no way I think I think most parents would look at that and say there's no way I would want my kid going through there with the air quality issues that exist as well as the noise, the noise level going through the tube. I don't think we talk about it enough, but it is it is deafening in there. And just I just don't see that as a real feasible crossing. And so I, I think it is important for Alameda to talk about these things, because what we're talking about really is equitable access on the west end of Alameda across the estuary for people that that travel in in a number of different ways. And not everybody has the ability to have and afford a single occupancy vehicle. We do have a lot of people that really need this crossing. And so if there's anything that staff from Ictsi leave here with tonight, it's that I want you to really hear the council saying unequivocally that this is a priority for us. This West End estuary crossing bike PED access is a priority. And I want to speak for myself and just tell you that it is one of my top and utmost priorities. Housing is certainly up there at the top of my list, but this is an equity issue. It's an environmental issue, and it's an absolute priority. And to me, this is a non-negotiable thing. And I think we need to all of us regionally find a way forward. I think and I've heard I also want to put out there, I've heard from Oakland's appointee to the commission. I know she spoke at length with Mayor Ashcraft and I've heard from her her commitments. I think what we're looking for and members of the public are really looking for is more than just a pat on the back . Be good player. Trust us. This will this will go through. And I think just the timing of this and how the conversations took place and the fact that we are up against a deadline, I appreciate that there's these bureaucratic deadlines that exist and we have to work around them and go with the flow. I appreciate our mayor for having these conversations and for bringing everyone here tonight to to sunshine it and to have the have the discussion publicly. But I think what what some of our advocates and activists are looking for is really something in writing that's going to be firmer than, hey, don't worry, you're going to get a fair shot at competing for these funds. And I think that that's their concern and I share that concern. So, yeah, so I think getting something a little more concrete about at least supporting moving forward we. And there's huge funding gaps. But I just want to say that I fully support the bike ped crossing and I'm happy with the improvements that have been made to this project. I don't love the The Tube walkway, but I also listen to the Transportation Commission weighing in and I thought they did make some good points. Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Vela, Councilor Odie. Sure. I'll weigh in now. So. I mean, at the onset, I'll just say, you know, I've I've been critical when people use the Sunshine Ordinance to kind of block things that I'm in favor of. But I also think it would be hypocritical if I basically say we should ignore it for something I am in favor of. So I'm a little bit disturbed about the my colleague's comment notwithstanding. I mean, the whole transparency on this issue. I'm deeply concerned because the way I understand this played out, know we had the letter and, you know, advocates of the crossing, the additional crossing, thought it was an opportunity to kind of leverage the only thing we really have to leverage to get funding for the next additional steps on the project. And then the letter went through the transportation committee in full sunshine, and it was changed. And the advice was to, you know, not give away portions of it right now. And then it came to the Council on an Agenda item, and there were objections to basically holding up one project that would benefit Chinatown, both from residents of Chinatown and Aluminums with connections to the Chinatown neighborhood. Valid connections. But at the same time, you know, there were concerns from the advocates of the Bike Walk Bridge that, you know, we really would not have any opportunity in the future to help secure funding. So there was the conditional letter that was sent out. And, you know, I spent a lot of the day today talking to a number of the advocates of the bridge and also folks that were concerned in Chinatown, because I think those are legitimate concerns as a project that's been on the board for 20 years. Right. You know, I'm fully supportive of that project. And, you know, I think to, you know, kind of threaten it or, you know, put it at risk. I think there were some valid concerns raised by my my folks that are concerned about the safety in the Chinatown neighborhood. You know, you know, I don't want to get into designing, but, you know, I don't think we should have a way where you can continue to do what you do today. But that's not really on my on my my to do list. So then we had well, those discussions are going on and there's community concern. Now there's a letter from Oakland that was in support dated November six that I saw for the first time this afternoon. There was a letter from AC DC dated yesterday that I saw for the first time this afternoon. There was a revised letter that the public had no input on. And, you know, I'm going to be irrelevant in a month, but I didn't think I'd be considered irrelevant today or that the rest of us would be irrelevant today, because it seemed that this was all done in a vacuum. And there were some legitimate concerns raised by both the advocates of the bridge and concerns about the advocates of this project that I think should have been fleshed out in public and not in private. I don't understand why that information could not have been conveyed to us, and we as a council could have could have made that decision. But, you know, a couple of things. I will I will comment on it. Yeah. And then we basically. We are always looking for a win win where we could not say that we're going to put one project at risk over another project, but also find a way where we could get some guarantee of some funding and we got one half of that win with this revised letter. But we don't have the other half of that win, so we don't have any guaranteed funding, and maybe that's possible, but I don't even think we have a path forward to that guaranteed funding. So I will say I like the the vice mayor suggestion that we get a commitment before we approve this letter from AC DC that their staff will make a they will make a commitment to recommend funding for the PSR and environmental study. I think that's a brilliant idea and I think it gets us closer to a win win. You know, just a couple of things. I don't think that the current Webster Street design or Webster tube design, that's not really multi-modal. I don't think that's what everyone thinks of when they think of some multimodal crossing. You know, I've never done it. I never will because I have asthma and I'm not going to subject myself to walking through that tube or biking through that tube. But I think the pictures of all those people walking and biking, that's not going to happen. I mean, let's just be real here about that. You know, the one thing I do appreciate about this process and, you know, speaking to Lina, I'm a former member of this council about her letter. You know, this really this has to be a collaboration. We can't do this without regional support. And I appreciate that. She took the time, you know, during a family emergency today to speak to me about this about this important issue. I'd like to see as part of any motion to approve this that we engage our state reps because they know they can have a lot of influence on Caltrans. And Caltrans, from what I understand, is who wants that additional right away, even more so than than bike pedestrians? I would like to see, as the vice mayor suggested, that we get a commitment from Ictsi today that they will make a recommendation to authorize this funding. And I'd like to see our alternate Mr. Naxalite also involved in this process because he is on AC DC as well. And you know, he's a very knowledgeable and person with a lot of expertize in this area who's been fighting for this topic for many years. So I wish we could have got a win win. I think we have a win. And then, I don't know, I'd like to get a win and a closer to a win. So I'm hopefully hopeful my colleagues can move the ball forward on both of these projects. Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Early Council for Design. Oh, great. Well, thank you very much. This project is a long time in coming. When it was first brought to my attention back in 1997, when I was on city council back then, it was certainly framed as improving Alameda Residences, access to 80, northbound or southbound to get to work, as well as being a safety related project along the way. Through the 2000, we certainly had to have some negotiations with stakeholders in in the vicinity, particularly Chinatown, Oakland's Chinatown. And it seems to me that at long last we've come up with a project that that can help residents get off the island, but also deal with some of the issues and concerns raised by residents and and those who are intimately involved in Oakland, Chinatown, some of whom live here in Alameda for a long time. My firm my foremost concern in all of this has always been getting Alameda ins off the island and to 80. And frankly, for the long, longest time that has been met, that has meant focusing on improving vehicular traffic out of Alameda through the tubes Posey tubes and hope and getting on to 880 as quickly as possible vehicular traffic because at the end of the day when you look at the data, vehicular traffic is whether it's on a single occupancy basis or whether it's on a carpool basis. At the end of the day, in terms of commuters, especially the morning peak hour commuters, that is the preponderance of of people needing to access infrastructure like Posey Tube, something like 74% of all commuters in Alameda who are employed take vehicles, whether it's by single occupancy vehicle, which is, I think 64% or whether it's carpooling, which is 9% as bus, 74%. And so and that has always been the case, and I suspect it will continue to be the case in too many years. Let us hope and I think it will be the case that future vehicular traffic will be electric and alternative fuels. But but we need this kind of infrastructure to facilitate that. My disappointment in this project, I will go ahead and express it is the sense that, you know, we have long. Frankly speaking, enjoy the 45 mile per hour speed in the posi tube. At least I've enjoyed it because it's the only place in Alameda where you can really go 45 miles per hour. Other than that short, small portion of Doolittle Drive, there is a small portion of the dual drive. But and, you know, knowing that we that we're going to change that 45 miles per hour to generally 35 miles per hour and then slow it down even more to 20 miles per hour before we take the. The horseshoe certainly is a concern. I can't see my time, by the way, but it seems to me the data is saying, even as we slow down the the the rate that travelers will be going through the Posey Tube, even as we slow that down, there will actually be time savings between the time that they enter the tube and get on into 80. Actually think the time saving is going to result because we're no longer going around, you know, the Chinese garden park. And I think most of the time savings is because of that and not because of the the time spent in the tube, but that. Be that as it may. The fact of the matter is, the data says significantly that there will be a 30% savings in time in 2025 and 2045. We can expect a 45% savings in time. So what that means, for example, if on average the the trip to the tube is. I don't know, 7 minutes. So instead of 7 minutes right now, it will now be roughly 4 minutes. If this is all to be believed. So I'm making my decision based upon the data that I'm seeing here. And I'm going to support this. I think it is needed infrastructure, especially for facilitating vehicular traffic out of the posi tube, especially in the morning peak commute hours. And as our island grows even more with more development, we're going to need this infrastructure to get started sooner rather than later. So I just want to thank every stakeholder who's been involved in this throughout the many years. I know there are outstanding issues. Like the bike bridge. I think that should be separate from the fact that we need to get going. The that as indicated in the earlier phase a the core project we need to get the core project going, which is the horseshoe and which is a on ramp down for people coming into Alameda in the evenings. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Councilmember de. Thank you. Good comments, everyone. I want to follow up on something the vice mayor said and and I will put this on gel a little bit on the spot that she volunteered to come to this meeting. And I'm really so glad that you were able to hear all the comments and from the members of the public. I wanted to highlight Councilmember Bell. I think she just as she often almost always does, is so eloquent in articulating some some great points. I mean, you're all you were all added to this discussion. But so I'm to the the ask by the vice mayor, what kind of commitment would DC staff make to recommending funding that we had originally asked for as a condition of our approval for it, for the for the Oakland Media Access Project. And you know, Andrew. Well, what what was possible. Yeah. Thank you, mayor and thank you councilmembers. And it is it has been very good to hear all of the comments by all of you as well as members of the public. And I certainly know the importance of this crossing. And Alameda CDC has committed to funding in the past for it. So as I said in my letter to you yesterday, if I can get a letter from the city of Alameda, I commit to bringing forward a consideration of the next phase for this project to my commission. I do want to note that the Commission funds by phases. We don't fund the project from a a feasibility study through construction because we need to fund BI phase. There's a lot of work I think we need to do between now and the time that it comes to the commission to make sure we're checking, recommending to the Alameda City Commission an appropriate level of funding and appropriate next phase. And I would like to work with your staff to address that. There's been discussion of a PSR, there's been discussion of environmental document, there's been discussion of estimated costs. And I think it's important that we have the opportunity to really sit down and talk about those those items so that we have something clear that we're actually bringing to the commission for their consideration. And I certainly welcome those meetings with you, Mayor, and with Vice Mayor John White as well, and staff from the city of Alameda . And we I'd be happy to set those up. As soon as I get your letter, we can start setting setting those up. And I committed to that yesterday. At your your muted nature. I will just add, it's not that I tried to exclude the vice mayor. It's just that we have this Brown act and we can make arrangements ahead of time before an item comes to to then just be the only two who are discussing something that's going to come to the council. But I thank you for for those remarks. So here's my feeling, and then I'll take a little more input from from counsel as to how you would like to proceed. I believe that it is important and essential that the city of Alameda, represented by this council approves gives our approval to the Oakland Alameda Access Project because it's what you have all stated and our speakers have very eloquently stated before us that these cars continuing to come through the tube and go around that lovely center, the Chinese garden, and and, you know, it just you wouldn't want that for for a center that you tried to to frequent. And it is has not been fair to Chinatown all these years. And now we have a solution. And it it really it is true. It is an auto centric solution. But we aren't going to stop cars from going through the tube. And so we certainly can stop the horrendous impact that they have had on Oakland's Chinatown. And I would hope that we don't hold that that project hostage. But as I told my policy committee a week ago, it's also possible for two things to be true at the same time and to need to move forward on them. Some of this is going to require trust because even sitting here tonight, we can't get the guaranteed funding. I mean, I just we can't get that tonight. Soon, I think we can get some pretty good assurances that it is there. I can tell you, I've had conversations with lots of my fellow commissioners about the importance of this project and gotten their enthusiastic support. And I, I really take that to heart. So what I'm looking for is how to move forward. Because the other thing I just want to touch on is that it was asked, why didn't this all happened a year ago? We should have been asking for funding a year ago. You know, a lot has happened in this year, in this year of COVID and everything else. But one of the biggest obstacles we had to deal with was the Coast Guard. And it was no easy feat at getting them to come around and see that it was possible to have this bridge over navigable waterways right outside a Coast Guard base. And again, I give huge credit. Rodney Pimentel, you're just the man of the hour tonight that because he I sit in meetings and I it could be like they're speaking Greek, but I can follow a little bit. But he understands he's a bridge engineer and he talks with the Coast Guard engineers and he understands their concerns and he is able to match every one of their questions with that, with an answer. And the Coast Guard has come around that it was not a quick and easy process, but here we are tonight. What should we do? I am open to suggestions and tell me what your pleasure is, Vice Mayor. And so I just want to ask a question of Mr. Rangel, if I could, because I think I heard her answer my question, and we may just be using different terms, but so when you say you will bring forward the city's request, I heard you say, you know, that we will commit I will commit to bringing to support bringing this forward. It sounded way the last time I heard you say it. It's anything you said as a staff recommendation to the council, to the to the committee was that was I was I trying to hear too much in your comments? Because I think that for me, the question is, are you bringing it forward, saying, hey, the city's asked about this or are you bringing this forward and saying, hey, we've been working with the city on always things that we are making a request. You know, we are we are bringing forward this recommendation, you know, as a recommendation of both AC, DC and the city of Alameda that we find the funding for the PSR in the air. So I just want to be clear, there are two things in the letter that I said yesterday. There are two pathways. There's one for the CHP, which I would not be able to bring a recommendation in January for the CHP. It's a competitive process. It needs to go through all the vetting and analysis. I cannot. Agreeing that what I can bring is the fact if I get a letter from the city requesting consideration for this because of the 2014 letter, then I can bring a recommendation for the Commission's consideration of the request. And I just want to be really clear that we only fund by phase in when I mean phase. That's their very distinct project development phases. And so what is in your memo is both the PSR and the environmental documents. And like I said, I'd like to talk with you and staff about what is the actual appropriate thing to bring to the commission for a next phase. Is the PSR the appropriate thing to bring? Is the cost appropriate that's there. I think there's more vetting that needs to happen for that. And I, I very much look forward to that conversation with with you the mate, with you mayor and with you vice mayor, as well as whichever staff you want to bring or however many staff you want to bring to have that conversation. And let me jump in here, if I may, for just a minute. Vice Mayor. You know, I'll just say right here in front of me on the screen, we've got staff and I know they've been working about on this and thinking about this. So, Mr. Thomas, in this waiver, be prepared to end mute when in answer to direct your line, Shell's comments, questions about, you know, we find in phases we'd need to know what the logical next phase is sitting here tonight. Do you know what that would be or do you need to have more more meetings? No, I this Andrew Thomas, I think what the executive director say makes sense. Let's let's formalize what the what is the logical next step? It is the continuation of the design process for members of the public. We have a feasibility study that we've been working on with Acts. It shows it's feasible to build a bridge we need to the next steps. From a layman's perspective, and I'm a layman here, not a bridge engineer. We need to actually sit down with Oakland and we've started these conversations like exactly where is this bridge going to be? Is it going to be on this street? On that street? Where do these where do the landings land? What are the logical next steps in this planning process that we need to do to then get to the next step, which will be the environmental process? And then the next step is the permitting process, and then the next step is raising the money to build it. And then so there's a series of steps. So I think that makes complete sense. I just I think what I heard the vice mayor asking is assuming we can scope out that next step, which I have no doubt that the people on this Zoom call can do that, you know, in short order, because we've been working on this and talking about it for months and months and months. I mean, I think the question for the vice mayor is, assuming we can work that out and it all makes sense, is TCE staff going to be just saying is are they going to be recommending it to their their commission? Can they and would they? That's the sort of I think that's kind of what the vice mayor is asking. Mr. Thomas. Is that is it the project study report you were describing. Or I mean, whether it's. Yes, I mean, essentially, you might it might go by a different name because it's a different process. But essentially, it's let's come up with the sort of essentially the final design and so that we can then get to the next step, which is the environmental review process. That's essentially what we have now. We have a project study report for the oakland alameda access project. It would be trying to get the bridge project to this to this level. And actually vice mayor. Or maybe this will. Be muted and ender, I think laid out the question I guess I'm so curious about. I'm not. Yeah, I'm less interested in what is the process to get to presenting because I think I'm clear on that. I'm still asking the question well asked. SCB partnering with the city to bring this as a recommendation for action, or will they be bringing it as forward as a Here's something for you to consider. The city has asked us to that's that's the that's the nuance on that that I'm looking for. It and if that was any. And thank you, Vice Mayor, then for Ms.. Martel, was that enough specificity from Mr. Thomas? That's not to say that to preclude any meetings, but is that a direction that you're looking for? I, I think there are a lot of technical, technical issues that we need to address in terms of what can position this project to go after funding. As Andrew mentioned, there is a large funding need for this project and we need to develop this project in a way where we do the right kind of studies that can open the pathway for funding. And that's where I would really like to have that conversation so that when we bring a recommendation and I've committed to bringing something to the commission for the next phase, that we are bringing the appropriate information that they can then consider as part of their own deliberation as an agency. That's a funding agency. You're muted. Yeah. As I tell other people that met a vice mayor. And still I've still I've I understand that and I'm on board with we need to figure out what is the right path and whatever else. The question still remains is, is it coming forth as a recommendation from staff or is it just coming forward as a something? Is it something for the the committee, the committee and the commissions? We we bring recommendations to the commission. Okay. So your staff will. Be we bring recommendations to our committees and our committees. Consider those recommendations. And then it's actually the committees that make the recommendation to the full commission. Excellent. Thank you. It's that that that was the nuance. I was trying to make sure I was correct. So with that with that clarity, I am happy to recommend a letter with direction to staff or to send that letter to AC DC and get those letters set up so that we can start that process that that executive director Jones has laid out for us. Thank you. And for clarification, you're recommending both approval of the letter the the the letter from the mayor and the letter to be sent from staff. Correct. That the front door has multiple times that she's waiting. For follow both pathways. But yes. The letter to start work. Yes. Yes. Thank you. And then the second by you. Right. And we're we're we're doing our letter and the staff, the revised letter, plus the two pathways in Mr. Rangel's letter, right? Correct. Yeah, good point, actually. Good point, Councilmember Odie, and thank you for the second. These are not mutually exclusive propositions, if I understand correctly. That's right. We can. Correct. We can have our cake and eat it, too. And yes, we this is and these are first steps to early funding, but. Yes. Okay, a second. Thank you. I'll get any further discussion. Seeing then we have a roll call vote, please. We've had a motion by advisory, endorsed by seconded by Councilmember Brody. Councilmember de thank. Councilmember Dusek, are you unmuted? Yes. Not quite. I. I. Avella. I may. Or as the Ashcroft. I and Councilmember Day said, for clarity, that was both. Yes. That you're unmuted and yes, that you're voting. Yes. Okay. That sounds unanimous to me. I want to thank everybody who's been here and this evening and for all the hours you've been working on this, and we'll work on this still some more. But I do think it was really valuable to to be able to hear from both our counsel and our public about what an important but important project these are, and we look forward to moving forward. So thank you so much, everyone on this. Good to see you. Council. We are so excited. We're going to take a break. We are going to be back at ten after ten. Okay. Ten, ten. We'll see you back. Thank you all. Great to see you. Take care. Thank you. Okay. She said. It's a long time from now. Tony. You might want to and you might want to mute just so people don't pick up conversations. Oh, but see, I'm counting just some Olivia. Here's Maria. Hi. And I bet you that's Councilmember Odie. I'm here now. Okay. Got it. And. Okay. Okay. Madam Clerk, are we. Are we ready? Yeah. Here's the things. Okay. All right, then. It is 1011. So we are resuming at the Alameda City Council meeting for November 17, 2020. And we're moving on to item six, the. Public hearing to consider adoption of resolution amending master fee resolution number 12191 to revise and add recreation and park fees for calendar year 2021. Thank you. And I was going to say, do we have Amy Wooldridge, our recreation projects director. Joining us. There she is. Good evening, Mr. Walters. How are you? Good evening, Mayor. Good, thank you. So good evening, Mayor. Thank you. So, Clerk, if we could please put up the PowerPoint presentation. Thanks, Laura. And. In advance of her slide probably. Yes. Thank you. So I'll go ahead and jump in. So there's a variety of factors that determine user fees for the Recreation and Parks Department fee schedule. These include rising costs for staff, contractual services, utilities, and we always are trying to balance these increasing fees with market demand.