YMPO advances plans to study bike-pedestrian safety, traffic

The Yuma Metropolitan Planning Organization’s executive board approved moving forward Thursday on two regional planning studies, including a longawaited one on bicycle and pedestrian safety.

The YMPO Technical Advisory Committee, a group of top city and county staffers, recommended vendors for the bicycle-pedestrian analysis and a traffic counts study, which were approved by the board 6-0.

YMPO Executive Director Paul Ward will work to negotiate contracts with Greenlight Traffic Engineering for the bike-pedestrian study and Kimley-Horne and Associates for the traffic counts.

If Ward does not reach an agreement with either one, he will then go to the next recommended firm, out of those who bid for the job.

Charles Gutierrez, YMPO senior planning/mobility manager, said he and the TAC board members were surprised that five firms submitted bids to do the bicycle study, along with three for the traffic study.

“I was excited to see so many proposals come in, but when I gave them to my TAC members they said, ‘Oh my gosh, I gotta read these,’” Gutierrez joked.

Both studies are expected to cost $85,000 or less, according to the YMPO’s request for proposals, and work to begin around mid-September. The bicycle/pedestrian analysis could take a year to complete, while the traffic count is to last six months.

The bicycle-pedestrian study will be used by Yuma County as the basis for a facilities plan for those users, a document local bicycling advocates have been asking to see completed.

Also Thursday, Ward updated the board on discussions he had with Arizona Department of Transportation officials in Phoenix in August, presenting the same analysis he had to the YMPO board in July.

He and other YMPO staff found that when Maricopa and Pima counties are excluded, Yuma County residents have been paying about 12 percent of total revenue. Yet only about 3 percent of the state highway program’s budget is spent here.

He said there could be a couple reasons behind that apparent shortfall, including a dearth of state high- ways which ADOT would be inclined to fund improvements for and of local matching funds.

Ward said he would like to make the same presentation to local county and city officials who hadn’t seen it yet, and had been told that the amount of money expected to be spent on Yuma County roads had been bumped up by $20 million to $78 million in one planning document.

“I have no idea whether I made any change to that at all. Probably not, but who knows. So the good news is that money seems to be going up,” he said. In other action Thursday, the executive board:

• Approved several changes to the countywide five-year transportation improvement plan requested by the Yuma County Intergovernmental Public Transportation Authority, which operates the YCAT bus system and on-call services.

• Another change to the TIP was approved, shifting an additional $250,000 to a bridge rehabilitation project at Avenue 74E and County 6th Street, because the concrete girders cannot be salvaged and will be replaced. The total budget now includes $750,000 in federal highway funds and $45,000 in local matching grants.